Next
by PeachDestroyer
Summary: After Akane went missing Kogami joins Ginoza and the rest of the new Division One to explore her strange disappearance, even if this means he has to return to Japan... Secrets will be exposed and lives lost as they have to face a far more dangerous enemy as expected in order to find Akane. / Set around 3 years after S1./HIATUS
1. Prologue

**It's my first fanfiction in this fandom and I'm quite excited. Also I'm not a native English speaker and learn it in school. Still I hope that my writing isn't that bad as I assume. However, when I estimated my skills wrong, I'm sorry.**

**I hope that this story is kind of enjoyable.**

**(Note: The only pairing I have is Kogami and Akane. And I hope it's okay.)**

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**Prologue:**

**The Wandering Souls Knows No Rest**

_"Ripples form on the water's surface, the wandering soul knows no rest"_

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Fresh air from the sea touched his face and icy wind blew through his hair. He had his eyes closed and listened to the calmly sound of the waves moving back and forth. And every time they came forth, they made the soles of his shoes wet. He didn´t mind.

He remembered the last time he had been at a beach. Back than he had been around five years old and his parents had taken him to a beach for a little daily trip. He remembered that his mother had been worried he could eat the sand or drown himself in the water. His father had to tell her over and over again that they are watching and that their son was too intelligent to do something like this. At the end of the day he had eaten a bit of sand and managed to get dirty all over his small body. Even if his mother nearly got a heart attack back than, this had always been one of his good memories.

Three years later the Sibyl System had taken over Japan. After years of preparations they had finally done it and he could remember how excited his mother had been after the System had been announced. She had always been a careful woman who got worried easily. For her the System meant safety and a light sleep. His father had laughed because of her excitement and he himself grinned because he had never seen his mother like that. But still the day the System came to life had always been one of the darkest days in his life.

One day, just one day, before the System took over everything his father had been killed by some maniac. Hadn´t he overworked that day, had he done it the next day, he would be still alive. With the System it had been almost impossible to kill someone on a open road, even it was late and the town slept.

They had got the message about his father´s dead a few minutes before midnight. Kogami Hayate had died just thirty minutes before midnight ‒ thirty minutes before the beginning of Sibyl. His mother always said that if the System had been secretly put on maniacs like the one who killed her husband never took their chance to commit one last crime before they probably would never had another chance to do anything.

In fact, the Sibyl System had took his father from him, took his life and now it took his. Kogami Shinya had left his homeland Japan just three months prior because he turned his back to the System and handled against its judgement. Because of that he was now a public enemy and he doubted that he could ever return to his old home. And he felt guilty that the dreams of the girl would never be fulfilled.

One month ago he had contacted this girl, Tsunemori Akane, his former superior, and she had sounded so relieved to hear his voice. She had always been kind of a joyful, optimistic girl and he couldn´t help but smile as she said she believed they would meet again someday, not as Inspector and Enforcer but as normal people. But Kogami could never return to Japan and he wouldn´t allow that she threw away her bright future just because she wanted to follow him. Someone like him didn´t have the right to destroy someones life, even if she had been hurt as he left. But he didn´t have a choice and she knew it.

Kogami wondered if she was doing well. She had taken the position of Sheperd One after Ginoza Nobuchika became a latent criminal. She had to lead a whole Division, just with a newbie by her side. Not long ago she had been one by herself but she had rapidly grown out of it. Of course she had Ginoza who worked now as an Enforcer under her and Kunizuka Yayoi, probably even analyst Karanomori Shion, but they couldn´t help her with everything.

When they had talked one month ago he had been ‒ to his surprise ‒ relieved himself to hear that Akane was alive and healthy. Since the day he flew he wondered day and night if she had been punished afterward by the System or the Bureau because she couldn´t prevent that Kogami killed Makishima Shogo, someone the System wanted alive. He could never have forgiven himself if something like this had happened. After all this hadn´t been her fault. It was all his.

He air was cold on his skin and he opened his eyes. He saw the blue-green sea which seemed to be eternal. She was somewhere by the other end of this sea, this ocean. And he wondered if she looked onto the ocean too, in this time, in this moment. And if she dreamed about a future, so beautiful and bright and eternal like the ocean. And if in this dream of a far, far future he was included.

He had thought he could forget everything and let it go. After all he had to build up a whole new life for him. Holding on the past wasn´t helpful. Especially if you knew you couldn´t go back. That you had to live on. Because it was the only thing you could do or you would just hurt yourself. And he really hoped she knew it too.

Still he lingered more and more to the past, to his home, as he left it more and more behind. He didn´t find his peace, even if he killed Makishima, he was still a restless soul and he probably would never be something else. He could only hope that Akane wasn´t like him.

Kogami stood still for a moment, still listening to the tranquil sounds of the water, letting them wash over him, letting their tranquility fall over him, and then turned to go. He had to sleep early when he wanted to catch his train tomorrow.

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**I hope you liked this chapter, this prologue.**

**I'm currently working on chapter three and I hope that enough people read this story, so I can happily continue!**

**Note: The name of the chapter and the little quote at the beginning derives from a poem named "Loveless". And if you already knew, you should know that this is a poem of _Final Fantasy VII - Crisis Core_. The one Genesis always quotes.**

**Have a nice day!**

**PeachDestroyer**


	2. Gathering of Old Friends

**Hey. Time for the first chapter, I think... ?**

**I ****_really_**** hope my English's okay. And you can read everything fluently.**

**Also I forgot to say the last time: Sorry, if the characters are a bit OOC. I'm afraid that I can't catch them properly... also some OOCnesses are on purpose! For example, Gino's... (you ****_will_**** find out why :) )**

**But now: Enjoy reading! ^^**

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**Chapter One:**

**Gathering of Old Friends**

_"A bond between souls is ancient - older than the planet."_

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He finally found him. After months of research and sleepless nights he finally found him.

He had put so much effort into this search than he ever did. And yet he was standing outside of his door and he didn´t knew what to say if he kicked the door open and would see him on the other side.

Of course he had many things to say, different things, more and less important. But he didn´t know how he should start. Next to him was standing a girl, just twenty years old with long dark brown hair tied up in a messy bun with an orange ribbon. She wore a black suit with dress pants and a white shirt ‒ similar to the clothes their superior always wore. Three years ago she had been assigned as a Inspector at the Public Safety Bureau. But after three years of work she was still a newbie who often did mistakes and someone always had to watch after her. Still she was a good girl and he was more than thankful to her that Shimotsuki Mika allowed him to do this search and went along with him, because Enforcers couldn´t go out without an Inspector.

Yet Inspector Shimotsuki Mika was standing next to him, considerately waiting for him, Enforcer Ginoza Nobuchika, to do his next step. She wasn´t even looking at him, probably not wanting him to think she would hurry his actions. After a while Ginoza took a deep breath and kicked the door open. He rushed in and Mika followed him.

Two months. It took him two months to find him. Because if he found his old colleague and friend, he would find the person he was actually searching for. Or so he thought. He couldn´t imagine her being somewhere else than here, here on the other side of this door. And he realised that he didn´t know what to say to her either. Of course, she broke a promise he made her to give him. But he could understand her. In those three years of insecurity about the whereabouts of their old friend Ginoza had not often thought about searching for him, hunting him down. But this probably tortured her over the last three years not only in the daytime but also in her dreams.

He had even thought that it would be him to be more worried about their friend in those last years, because she had known him just for a short period of time and he had been best friends with him since high school. In the months the three of them had worked together, back then when Ginoza still had been an Inspector, he already did recognised that there had been something between them, but he didn´t bother himself to really think about it. For him this had been something so insignificant like a leaf falling from a tree back then. But after his disappearance his sight had begun to open and he had finally seen it, _really_ seen it, how much hurt Tsunemori Akane had been after that. And he finally realised that this thing, this thing he couldn´t quite categorise, was something immensely, something powerful. So powerful it drew them together and hurt them if the other one was not around.

Ginoza and Mika stood in a floor. Holograms were on, painting the walls and floor wooden and old. Warm, golden light filled the floor. They took a few steps into the apartment and then someone appeared on the other side of the floor.

His hair was a bit longer than the last time he saw him and he wore a loose shirt and surprisingly jeans, but beside that he still looked like the same Kogami Shinya he knew, with the sharp grey eyes and the face with the hard and delicate lines. His eyes widened as he recognised Ginoza and he frowned as he saw Mika.

_Of course_, Ginoza thought. _He doesn´t know her._

"Gino?", Kogami said and he sounded a bit amused but mostly surprised. A short laugh escaped his mouth.

"I never thought you would be the one standing in my floor someday. I´ve always imagined... " ‒ he briefly hesitated ‒ "I´ve always imagined that Inspector Tsunemori would be the one"

Ginoza suddenly felt something heavy in his chest. _No... please no..._

"Does... does that mean Inspector Tsunemori isn´t here?" he asked.

Kogami frowned.

"Should she?" And then his astonishment and bewilderment left his face and gave their places to realisation.

"What happened, Gino?" he asked and Ginoza swallowed hard. He had been so certain that she would be here. Where else could she be but here?

That Tsunemori Akane would be in the end somewhere else than by Kogami Shinya never crossed his mind. Just because he wouldn´t let the thought enter his head that something more serious could have happened to her than just the fact that she couldn´t withstand her deep desire to see Kogami again.

"Gino – _what happened?_" Kogami asked again, his voice hard and more or less surprisingly fearful, still it didn´t shake. He would never allow himself to let his voice shake, to let his wall fall. And because of that, Ginoza knew this special bond between him and the Inspector really existed, that he had been right. That her pain had never been one-sided like she had always thought.

The poor Mika who was looking between them had no idea what was going on. Naturally she knew about Akane but she didn´t know Kogami and had not the slightest idea how deep the relationship between them actually was. Ginoza doubted that he knew it either, probably even Akane and Kogami had no idea. But still she didn´t say a thing. Let the Enforcer his freedom. She knew that it was a thing between those two men.

Again Ginoza took a deep breath. He didn´t know how his old friend would react to this information exactly. But he knew that he would be furious.

"Tsunemori... Inspector Tsunemori Akane is missing... for two months"

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**In fact I never wanted to give a quote before every beginning of a chapter but I always liked something like this and thought: "When I wanted to do it for some chapters, why not for all?". So every chapter has a quote! Yey!**

**This one is from Dianna Hardy's _The Witching Pen_. I never read it, but I found the quote and thought it would fit for this chapter.**

**Also: Even if it was revealed how Kogami's mother is named (Her name is Tomoyo!), his father's name wasn't. So the "Hayate"-thing isn't canon. I forgot to say this in the last chapter...**

**I hope you liked the last chapter and this one and it would make me really happy if you reviewed!**

**Have a nice day!**

_**Momo**_

**_\- currently working on chapter six_**


	3. The Disappearance of Tsunemori Akane

**Another chapter!**

**I'm currently really happy and updated every story which is not aborted on the German version of and said... "Why not the _Next_ too?"**

**I'm really happy that so many people read this! *being all happy and stuff***

**I hope my writing's okay.**

**Also... warning OOCness on Kogami's side, Ginoza's side... on everyone's side, in fact. But these are the ones appearing. Along with Mika, but we don't know her that much, so I had no choice than creating a nature for her on my own. And I hope my efforts weren't just poor.**

**Okay, enough talking.**

**Enjoy reading!**

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**Chapter Two:**

**The Disappearance of Tsunemori Akane**

_"Such silence has an actual sound, the sound of disappearance"  
_

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Kogami took the news better than expected. He didn´t killed some of his furniture or punched a hole into his wall. He just stood still, his face hard and starring at Ginoza.

"What do you mean, she´s missing?" he asked slowly, piercing his old friend with his gaze.

Ginoza sighed. "You know what I mean, Kogami. She isn´t there, she´s missing. Two months ago she entered the Bureau the last time and then vanished. First the Division thought she caught a cold but then she just didn´t come back. Also she didn´t reported to the Chief that she was sick. Or did she report anything to anyone. Nobody knows where Tsunemori is. I thought she would be with you. That she finally found you and hurried after you before you could change your location. Even if it is not my business what she decides to do with her life, I just wanted to be sure that Tsunemori really was with you. So I did some researches and found you. I was quite surprised that you was in China. I always thought you would already be somewhere in Europe or America and not in Asia anymore"

Kogami run his hand through his thick black hair. His grey eyes were unreadable.

"Where you working on a case at that time?" he wanted to know.

"No" Ginoza said after a while. "Because of that I thought she would be here"

Kogami run his hand again through his hair, letting it stuck out into weird directions. Then he turned and walked into a room and Mika and Ginoza followed him. It was a living room, sparely decorated. With only a little table, a sofa, some chairs and a little bookshelf. Kogami let himself fall onto the sofa, gesturing them to sit down too. After everyone had caught a seat and Mika had finally closed the front door Kogami began to talk.

To Ginoza´s surprise he looked over to Mika who widened her dark brown eyes as she recognised that Kogami laid his look on her.

"I´m sorry. I didn´t introduce myself. My name is Kogami Shinya, former Enforcer of the Public Safety Bureau in Tokyo and now a fugitive"

"Nice... nice to meet you Kogami Shinya-san. I heard a lot about you. I´m Shimotsuki Mika"

He leaned back on his sofa.

"So you´re the new Inspector of Division 1? The one who replaced Gino?"

Mika nodded. "Indeed"

"What kind of things did you hear about me?"

She blinked. "Excuse me?"

"You said that you heard a lot about me, Inspector Shimotsuki. What kind of things did you hear?"

She briefly looked over to Ginoza and then swallowed. "I know that you were an Enforcer and an Inspector before you killed Makishima Shogo and had to leave Japan because the System wanted him alive and didn´t approve the fact that you turned against them"

Kogami´s grey eyes were dark and it was impossible to get to know what he was thinking right now. _What does he want?_ thought Ginoza and looked to them.

"Go on, Inspector. What do you also know?"

"You knew Kagari Shusei and Masaoka Tomomi and worked for the Bureau for eight years", Mika said.

"Go on", urged Kogami.

_Why do you avoid the fact that Tsunemori is missing?_ Ginoza thought. _Why do you keep asking such non-relevant things?_

Again Mika swallowed. "You... You were also quite close to Akane-san"

Kogami closed his eyes and breathed out.

"So... what do you mean with... 'close'?"

Ginoza could see how Mika struggled with herself to stay calm. "You... you were colleagues, partners. And possibly friends. Akane-san often worried about you, asked herself where you went and hoped you would be save and happy wherever you are, Kogami-san"

He opened his eyes again, the colour of them darker than before.

"I was her subordinate, but for her we were partners. I don´t think we were ever friends"

He stood up, going to a window and looking outside, watching the shimmering lights of the city which were reflected in his eyes and slightly illuminated his sharp face.

"So... she was worried about me? She told that to you?"

Mika nodded again. "I... I asked her why she was sometimes looking far away and why her eyes turned so sad when she did while we had lunch together. She smiled sadly and told me about you. How you had to leave the country and she was still hurt after all the time, even if she usually doesn´t show it"

For a few minutes everything was silent. Kogami still looked outside, the lines of his face now frozen.

"So... Tsunemori is missing?" He rubbed his neck after some time. "What exactly did happen, Gino?"

His eyes narrowed. "Kogami, first you nearly freak out because of Tsunemori and then you ask Shimotsuki some silly, unimportant questions, only to get back to Tsunemori again"

"First of all you kicked open my door", he said bitterly.

"Oh, come on, Kogami. You just wanted to know if she already gave you up. That she had been stronger and would not be so immensely worried about you like you are about her", Ginoza snapped and the silence returned for a bit. Again it was Kogami who spoke first.

"What exactly did happen, Gino?" he re-asked, making him furious. But before he could say one more thing, Mika raised her voice.

"After Akane-san had been absent from work for three days and we got to know that she never reported some kind of illness, we went to her apartment", she said, clearing her throat. "We found nothing suspicious. No marks of a fight, nothing was missing. No note, nothing. Her jellyfish, Candy, also witnessed nothing. So Ginoza-san thought she must be here or at least where you are, Kogami-san"

He again rubbed his neck. "No fighting marks? Nothing missing? Did you see the recordings of the street cameras?"

"Yes, we did. But nothing suspicious on them too. At exactly 22 o´clock Akane-san entered the building where her apartment is and doesn´t come out after that. It´s like... it´s like she just _vanished_"

For a moment Kogami said nothing, probably thinking about the possibilities. "Tsunemori, if she really hunted after me, would already be here. I wanted to move every month into a new city, but I decided to stay here three months ago. I thought in this unusually small city, nobody notices, nobody would find me. Probably she got caught on her way here. But then they would have hunted after me too. Also, she would never just run away. I see no point, why she should do something like that", he said more to himself than to Ginoza or Mika. Then he looked to the young Inspector.

"Do you know if she made herself enemies? She was an Inspector after all"

Mika thought a while about it. "I don´t think so. Everyone we hunted down in the last three years is either in medical care or dead. And I think Akane-san wasn´t the kind of person to have any enemies, even as an Inspector"

Ginoza had followed the little conversation of those two without interrupting, but now he couldn´t withstand anymore.

"I don´t want to say this, but of all people you are possibly the only one able to find Tsunemori. Not only because you were the one of us who was the closest to her"

Kogami looked over to his old friend. His eyes briefly flashed up.

"So you did not befriend her _in three years_? I´m disappointed, Gino"

Ginoza´s eyes darkened. "We... we grew a bit closer over the course of the years, but after your disappearance she never quite opened up to anyone again. She talked to us and seemed fine and as always, but in fact she avoided us, more or less"

The former Enforcer again turned to the window and silence filled the room. After some time he left the room without saying a word, leaving Mika and Ginoza on their own in the living room.

"Do we really need his help, Ginoza-san?" whispered Mika.

"It would make it easier to find Inspector Tsunemori. He, of all people, knows her the best", said Ginoza dryly. He didn´t like the fact that he had to rely on Kogami.

"But he _left_", replied she. "Even if we truly need his help, he left without saying a thing. I don´t think he will help us"

"He will", Ginoza said definitely.

Mika blinked. "How will you know? I know that Kogami Shinya had been the best of you back then. But he is a fugitive now. And I don´t think he can help us when he gets imprisoned or killed, trying to enter Japan. Also, even if Akane-san and he were once colleagues, it doesn´t seem that he really cares about her. He himself said that they were never friends"

"He pretends, he´s a pretender. He does care about Tsunemori. But he would never say this aloud. Kogami isn´t that kind of guy. And he will help us to find her. You will see"

"But that doesn´t solve the problem that Kogami Shinya is a public enemy in Japan... ", Mika started, but cut off as Kogami entered the room, a strange looking helmet in his hands.

"Sorry, it took a bit time to find it. Good that I didn´t throw it away. And I really hope you didn´t joke about Tsunemori"

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**The quote is by Suzanne Finnamore.**

**Oh, I really enjoy these quotes. It's funny to find one, picking one, laughing and smiling on all the others you find while searching. It's great.**

**Hm... see you next time!**

**Momo**

_**\- who got distracted by the sequel and is still working on chapter six.**_

**PS: Little question: If I had to upload a chapter with over 6000 words, should I cut it in two or upload it as a whole? (NOT, that this sequel-chapter is that long... *whistling innocently*)**


	4. For the First Time

**Yey! Another chapter!**

**And thank you, KazeLand, Sakura Crystals, Nakamura Arashi and the two anons - el and mariaelennaella - for your reviews! And for all the others who follow and favo!**

**And this time we finally get to know something about Akane - even if not about her current situation.**

**I hope I didn't do that much mistakes and Akane's not that much OOC!**

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**Chapter Three: **

**For the First Time**

_"Luck always seems like it belongs to someone else"_

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_Two months ago_

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She breathed heavily as she run. Her legs began to protest, even if she had always been good in long distance running. Also her left arm hurt. She didn´t had the time to pull the broken pieces of glass out.

It was August, but the night was unusually cold and she shivered. Or she only felt that way because she only wore a thin light blue nightgown and her feet were bare. She didn´t have any weapons nor had a place to hide. If she was found, it would mean her end. But she wasn´t someone who gave up easily. Or immediately lost all hope. She was a optimist, a believer, and she knew that she could survive if she would just stay vigilant.

Going back to her apartment, wasn´t an option. Neither could she go to the apartment of her fellow Inspector Shimotsuki Mika. It would just cause trouble to the girl and she didn´t want to drag an out-stander into this. This was her business and her´s only. Mika didn´t have to do anything with it. And she would never forgive herself if she would die, only because her superior was cold and got herself into serious business. _Also_, she thought, Mika´s _home is probably being watched. So I can easily be caught if I want to go there._

As well she couldn´t go to her old friend Minase Kaori. On the one hand she couldn´t go because of the same reason she couldn´t visit Mika, on the other she didn´t speak to her much after the death of their friend Funahara Yuki.

_Yuki._

By the sole thought of her deceased friend her heart seemed to turn into ice. For a short period of time Tsunemori Akane let herself drift away by the thought of her friend. Then she shook her head and focused on the more important thing in this moment. Yuki died three years ago. She grieved enough and this was definitely not the right time to fall into sorrow.

Now she had to run. She had to survive. And even if she never wanted to do something like this ‒ she had to find a place she could flee to.

Akane walked through the dark streets of Tokyo, shivering. She was not able to put her arms around her, she barely felt her left one being _there_. Her feet were also cold and every step on the hard ground hurt her. If she had had the time to slip into a pair of shoes...

Carefully she walked along. She had to as far from her apartment as possible. And she had to look out after her haunter. After Akane had jumped out of her window she had been glad she was still alive. Fortunately, her apartment was located in the third floor and not in the sixtieth. Also she had taken more training lessons in the past three years to get her body strong. She was relieved that the hard work had paid off.

After a while she entered a quite unfriendly block. But it was strangely not unfamiliar. A smile sneaked onto her face. Here she had had her very first case. With the smile in her face she walked deeper into the block.

It had been her first day at work and she already had a case, a quite serious one. Akane could remember everything like it had been yesterday: The man who had kidnapped this woman, the paddy wagon, the Dominators...

She looked behind her. Nobody followed her. Just a few strange looks because she was barefoot and was just wearing a nightgown. Akane avoided the looks of the others, just walked along into a old building. She ensured that nobody was there and then seated herself into a corner of this building. Hopefully nobody did see her entering. At least here weren´t any street scanners.

Akane leaned against the cold wall and tightened her legs. She put her healthy arm around them.

Back than everything had been new to her. And she had been incredibly afraid to make something wrong. In the end, after they had killed their target with a Dominator, she had prevented to let his hostage get killed, even if her crime coefficient had risen because of her fear and the cruel things she saw and what the man did to her. And then she had shot Kogami Shinya with her Dominator on Paralyse Mode. Akane couldn´t remember the words he said to her, before turning and trying to shot the woman. But she could remember the anger in Ginoza Nobuchika´s face. And how relieved she had been, because Kogami had even approached her doing.

The cold of the walls entered through the thin material of her gown and laid himself onto her skin, making her shiver more. But she didn´t mind. The memory of her first day of work had been a bad one for a long time. But then worse things came. Yuki´s death, her death right in front of her very own eyes, Kagari´s "disappearance", when Kogami had left her a letter he thought would be his farewell letter to her. And of course the time Akane had heard the gunshot which had taken Makishima Shogo´s life away. This always had been and was her worst memory. Because this gunshot had meant that Kogami had become a murderer and a fugitive. And that she would probably never see him again. Yes, she never was the one lucky one, never had been, would never be. Luck always seemed so far away to someone like her.

Akane laid her head onto her knees and closed her eyes. After three years she still believed that they would meet each other some day again. But what if she would die in this night? What if her haunter would find and kill her? He had called her four months after his disappearance to say that she shouldn´t be that much surprised and sad to hear that his corpse had been retrieved somewhere. After all she didn´t hear anything in that way in the last years and was more than relieved that this meant he was still alive. But Akane never thought, that, if she was the one dying first, Kogami would hear it and how he would react to it. He always thought he would be the one to die first, not her.

Her chest felt suddenly incredibly empty, thinking about Kogami. In her imagination she saw his face, his sharp face, the grey eyes, the wild black hair, and she hoped he was okay and save. And she wondered if he hoped that she was okay too.

For a while she just listened to the noises in front of the old building, the rats running above the floor in the darkness, the silent whispers of the wind, entering from holes in the walls, and tried not to think about Kogami Shinya. But her thoughts consistently went solely to him. Akane knew she had more important things to think about: About her haunter, about finding a safe place, about surviving until the morning ‒ how she should go on from now. But her mind drifted to Kogami, over and over again. She couldn´t help but worry about him. And she couldn´t help but be angry to him for leaving her like this. Like she always had in the last three years.

And after some time she felt asleep, her arm numb, with only the coldness of the air as a blanket and an unwound future ahead.

* * *

**The quote is from David Levien's "City of the Sun".**

**The "unwound future"-part is a reference to the game "Professor Layton and the Unwound Future". And the ones who played it know how important the title drop was in the game.**

**Oh. I hope you had a nice read. And I hope you all will keep following and probably - reviewing!**

**Have a nice day!**

**Momo**

_**\- currently working on chapter seven due to other responsibilities and trying not to get that much attracted**_


	5. Shattered in Pieces

**Oh, finally a new chapter!**

**And because someone said my English was really bad, I got a Beta-reader.**

**Thanks, AruuYuda-ShoriKyuyu, for helping me out! You saved me! Thanks!**

**And now a new chapter. Enjoy reading. ^^**

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**Chapter Four:**

**Shattered In Pieces**

_"All I can think about is what she must be doing, and how I wish she were still here."_

* * *

The way back home had been not just incredibly long, but also silent.

Ginoza and Kogami didn´t say a word and Mika didn´t get herself to raise her voice. Also Kogami had been wearing the strange looking helmet for most of the time, which didn´t allow light to shed on someone´s face. With that on, he looked like a robot.

Still, she couldn´t imagine how someone scary like Kogami Shinya got so close to her superior Tsunemori Akane. Akane had always been cheerful, even on the darkest days. She was also very optimistic and so faithful. She got along well with Kunizuka Yayoi, Ginoza, the analyst Karanomori Shion and Moriwaki Naoki, the newest Enforcer of their Division. And of course Mika. Kogami and Ginoza seemed to silently hate each other, or something like that. She didn´t know much of their past, but a big part of it had to lay in the shadows, when they snapped at each other like that. But they seemed to be very close too... For example, Ginoza knew that Kogami would come with them to find Akane. It would be very nice if someone could clear everything to her. After all, she was walking in darkness and ignorance ‒ something she didn´t like.

Karanomori, Kunizuka, Akane and Ginoza knew all of those things, but they kept themselves silent. Fortunately, Mika had Naoki, who was so uninformed like herself. In fact, he was the only one who was truly close to her in the Bureau despite their age difference of thirteen years. Sometimes they were joking about the fact that Akane and Mika were the youngest of their Division and still their Shepherds while the "hunting dogs" were all older than them.

The first year of her work in the Bureau had been nice with Akane, Kunizuka and Karanomori being so friendly to her and her recognising Kunizuka as the one who comforted her back then, after her best friend got killed by Oryo Rikako. Even if Ginoza always lectured her about everything, and even if she was a bit angry at Akane for always putting her together with him. Mika had thought that she did it solely to annoy her. But still her days at work first became warm when Naoki was transferred to them.

Mika didn´t have any siblings and she barely saw her parents. They always had to work and because of that, she had been sent to Oso Academy, which was not only a school but a boarding school. After Oryo Rikako killed Kawarazaki Kagami and Okubo Yoshika, she didn´t have any friends left. So she had been really happy with Naoki and she began to get along really well as friends with him. The Inspectors of the other Divisions always looked at them darkly or shook their heads whenever Mika and Naoki crossed ways with them. Most Inspectors thought that it wasn´t good to befriend Enforcers, they were "hunting dogs" after all. So she had been sad at first when she thought that they could never be friends. But Akane told her that it was fine to be friends and get along well with an Enforcer. Mika had always been thankful to Akane for many things, but this one had been the most important.

Even sadder Mika had been after they found out about Akane´s disappearance. Like Kogami said, she wasn´t someone who would run away for no reason. And it was more than just fishy – that Akane entered her apartment but never left and suddenly just disappeared, vanished into thin air.

She hoped that she was okay wherever she was. Truly hoped.

* * *

They had reached Japan after two very long hours of nerve-wracking silence. They had to secretly get to Tokyo because it wasn´t safe for Kogami to walk around with this helmet in bright sunlight. As they finally arrived at a relatively old, simple house, quite far from the city, Mika collapsed into a chair, exhausted.

This house once belonged to Ginoza´s father, Masaoka Tomomi, also a former Enforcer of Division One. And here Ginoza decided to hide Kogami. This place was far enough from the city and completely offline. Also, no scanners were in the immediate area and nobody would know that someone lived here, so nobody could secretly do a hue check on him. Nobody would just sneak in and try to rob something or just sleep there for a night, because everybody knew that this house held nothing expensive and that this was a private place under the supervision of Division One of the Public Safety Bureau. So, in fact, this was the safest place Kogami could hide.

Mika just had enough rest right before Ginoza told her that it was time to go back before someone noticed their absence. Annoyed, she looked at him. Sometimes he forgot that she was the Inspector and he the Enforcer, not the other way around. She just sighed and stood up, even saying goodbye to Kogami who no longer looked that much scary without the helmet.

As they went she took one last look at Kogami, who was watching them from a window. And she shivered as she saw his grey eyes which were as hard as stone.

* * *

She was gone.

Tsunemori Akane was truly gone. Disappeared, missing, lost.

He still couldn´t quite understand this. How could this happen? She was an Inspector of the Public Safety Bureau, not someone who lived far, far away like an eremite. And she also wasn´t someone who would get kidnapped easily. She probably would fight a bit and then run away, going back to the MWPSB. But then she would be there and not missing. Also, the things Inspector Shimotsuki Mika had told him just didn´t fit together. How did Akane manage to get missing in her own apartment? With no one getting near her?

Kogami had investigated much cases but nothing seemed so impossible like this one. And unfortunately it was the one about Akane´s disappearance.

He couldn´t help but hit a nearby wall as hard as he could. She could be anything in this moment ‒ dead, alive, tortured, starving, lost, in the middle of the ocean... a bit like Schrödinger´s cat. For a moment his heart skipped to a surprise as he thought about her being dead. He always thought he would die before her. That she would be the one grieving above a corpse, not he.

He was really surprised when he found himself worrying so much about her. Over the last three years, he often caught himself thinking about her. What she was doing in this moment, how she was going. But he never felt so worried about her like in this second.

Of course, before that, Kogami assumed she would be safe.

It quite surprised him that he was wishing Akane to be somewhere safe so badly; that if she were in trouble, she would be able to escape and find a safe place to hide, not being tortured or even dead. She had been the first one to see him not only as an Enforcer, a filthy "hunting dog", but as a person. For her, he had always been a partner, not just a dog, a will-less machine, but a human. And with that attitude of hers, she managed to remind him what he always intended to do ‒ being a detective to protect, not to bring someone down. Kogami had always liked her and had been thankful because of that.

Akane had always been a bit different from other people, he knew that. She saw things differently and couldn´t quite understand why others didn´t share her point of view. _How could Enforcers be anything else than humans?_

With her, he felt like someone. So it shouldn't be surprising that he worried and cared about her so much.

Kogami slipped down onto a chair and grabbed the helmet, lying on the table in front of him. He always wanted to get rid of this device, this device Makishima Shogo had created. But he also had known that if he failed doing this someone could find it and it would be easier to track him, so he kept the helmet. And yet he was even relieved he had kept it. He put the helmet back onto the table and looked at the window, at the scene beyond it. After all those years he was finally back in Japan, something he never imagined.

Sighing, he leaned back, remembering the talk he and Ginoza had as the girl, Mika, had fallen asleep for a while.

* * *

_"So you grew closer to Inspector Tsunemori, Gino?" Kogami asked through the helmet which warped his voice slightly. Shimotsuki Mika was asleep for five minutes now and had already begun to snore._

_"Hm?" Ginoza turned to face him, even he actually couldn´t see his face._

_"You said earlier that you and Tsunemori grew closer over the last years", he repeated._

_Ginoza frowned. "So... is this the only thing that keeps you busy?"_

_"I´m just curious about what did happen in the last three years in the MWPSB. For example, why you don´t wear glasses anymore."_

_He raised one eyebrow. "You know that I never needed glasses, I wore them to cover my eyes a bit."_

_"Because you didn´t like your face, especially your eyes. So ‒ why the sudden change, Gino?"_

_For a while Ginoza was quiet. "I cleared everything with my dad."_

_Even if was for just a second, Kogami smiled under his helmet._

_"And", Ginoza went on. "Tsunemori and I are a couple."_

_Because of the helmet, he couldn´t see the genuine shock which took over Kogami´s expression. Ginoza never told jokes. He even doubted that his old friend had the capability to joke. So he was saying the truth. _He was saying the truth.

_"But you said that you _didn´t_ befriend her", he replied, trying not to sound shocked and astonished. His body began to feel numb. The serious look on Ginoza´s face didn´t help._

_"I did not _befriend_ her, yes. We didn´t become friends, we became a couple. Why do you think I did some crazy research other the last months to track her down? Because I´m in love with her. I feared Akane ran away to you because she didn´t want to marry me anymore. So I searched for you in order to convince Akane that she doesn´t have to be afraid, that she _didn´t_ make the wrong decision when she said ´yes´ as I proposed to her. But now, I´m just worried about her."_

_Kogami suddenly felt really dizzy and sick. His head spun as he tried to imagine ‒ _of all people_ ‒ Akane and _Ginoza_ as a couple, as bride and groom. Fortunately he wore the helmet, so Ginoza wasn´t able to see his expression._

_The last time he saw them, he had finally acknowledged her as a fellow Inspector and they slowly started to get along. How the hell did they become a couple in three damn years? If he hadn´t worn the helmet, Kogami knew, he probably had vomited onto the floor. Imagining Ginoza and Akane, damn it, as a couple really was... heavy. Heavy and kind of creepy for him. It took him some time to handle the new information he got until he was able to say something again. After all, they were his former colleagues and Ginoza was an old school friend. And he couldn´t say that he imagined them to grow old on their own and die alone. In fact, he was even a bit relieved that Akane wasn´t going to marry someone he didn´t know or someone he didn´t know would ever hurt her. And Ginoza definitely told him the truth, he never joked, after all._

_Kogami swallowed to drown the dryness in his throat. "Congratulations, Gino", he said. "But how... how could you imagine doing this? You´re an Enforcer and you will never be able to leave the Bureau without an Inspector. Also I don´t think Kasei or the System would approve of your relationship."_

_The Enforcer shrugged. "That is the thing Akane is worried about. Even if we told Kasei about everything and she allowed the marriage and everything after a while of thinking."_

_Again, Kogami swallowed. That Ginoza kept calling her "Akane" didn´t help either._

_"Congratulations", he repeated. "I´m happy for you. Finally you can give Pops the grandchildren he wanted ever since, even if he´s already dead. His ghost will be relieved and full of bliss."_

_"I´m kidding", Ginoza said suddenly, his green eyes flashing up sharply._

_Kogami blinked. "You can´t be. You _never_ told a joke"_

_He shrugged again. "I learned this in the last three years. I really wanted to see your face as I told you I was going to marry Inspector Tsunemori. But your body language and the fact that you tried to keep your voice from shaking said enough for me."_

_Kogami wanted to reply, but Ginoza didn´t leave him any time._

_"You have no idea what happened in the last three years. You really haven´t. But I wanted to tell you one thing: if we find Inspector Tsunemori, you shouldn´t expect her to welcome you with open arms. Your departure kind of changed and destroyed her. And I can´t say. She rarely didn´t look like she wants to hunt you down. Not to see you again, but to knock your stuffing out of you."_

_"Aren´t we talking about Tsunemori?"_

_He glared at Kogami. "I don´t know how she will react if she sees you. Nobody knows. But I just wanted to warn you: It can be that she won´t be happy, but she will finally have the chance to be mad at you."_

* * *

**The quote is from Pittacus Lore's "I am Number Four". And amusingly this is the fourth chapter.**

**Also, because I think no one got the allusion but myself: The "Vanished into thin air"-part was a reference to Gordon Edgley's book "Into Thin Air" (Skulduggery Pleasant).**

**Thank you all for reading and it would be nice if you would also not only read but also review.**

**Nice day, guys!**

**Momo**

_**\- currently working on chapter ten and also being incredibly busy with other things**_


	6. Swann's Way

**Voilà. Aquí. Da. Here. Ecco. The longed for next chapter of "Next"! (What a silly word play... )**

**AruuYuda-ShoriKyuyu finished the chapter by yesterday but I only saw it by today. (Different time zones.) And again she did a brilliant job. You all should thank her! (Without her the story would be full of silly mistakes... )**

**Thanks, Aruu!**

**So. New chapter, eh? The last time Kogami was tricked by Ginoza and now they're going to search desperately for clues.**

**Beware of silly dialogues and a kind of "gooey" part at the end...**

**... and a "past"-part with Akane!**

**See me failing terribly to do a "poem" and Mika being more helpful than in canon. (Canon Mika -.-)**

**All this awaits you in this chapter.**

**And now: Enjoy!**

* * *

**Chapter Five:**

**Swann´s Way**

_"Always try to keep a patch of sky above your life"_

* * *

He could remember the time he said her name the first and only time. It had been nothing more as an impulse back than, seeing her on the back of a truck, a truck driven by a maniac.

Akane had always been so reckless, but of all the things she had ever done, this had been the most reckless. And every time this memory crossed his mind, the memory where he had thought for a split second that she could have been gone forever, that Makishima could have killed her before Kogami reached her, he felt something like he did back then when he had seen Akane at the back of the truck and already imagined Makishima killing her, a grin all over his face. It had been a cold, icy feeling ‒ as his heart had turned to ice, lying heavily in his chest, slowly freezing his body. And in this split second he imagined a world without her and his frozen heart cracked because of it. And this feeling hadn´t vanished, his heart shattering with every step, until he finally reached her, until he had seen her lying unconsciously in the high grass, injured, but alive. The ice on his heart and body had slowly melted as he had picked her up, feeling her body heat on his fingertips, and carried her into safety.

Kogami sighed as he rolled down from his bed. In what kind of danger did she drag herself into? He stood up, another sigh escaping his mouth as he stretched. He didn´t get that much sleep last night. His mind always drifted to the case and not into sleeping.

He went to the bathroom, undressed himself and stepped into the shower. For a few minutes he just let the warm water fall upon his body, letting the heat of the water sink into his skin, burning the coldness away which came with the memory of the last time he had seen Tsunemori Akane and the thought that it could have been the last time forever. Then he began to wash himself properly and stepped out of the shower, towel wrapped around him. As he dried himself and began to dress, Kogami thought about the last time he had been in Japan. He had last seen Akane on the day he killed Makishima Shogo, but he had departed a few weeks later ‒ a few days after Masaoka´s funeral.

Kogami had been there, at the funeral. In fact, this had been the only reason why he didn´t leave immediately back then. It had been a perfectly fine day, a sunny day, a beautiful day. And definitely not the day for something so depressing as a funeral.

While Division One and other people of the Bureau silently grieved upon their lost friend and colleague, Kogami had been watching from a safe distance, avoiding to look towards Akane´s direction. Because he had known, she didn´t only mourn because of Masaoka but also of him ‒ the other colleague she had lost, not to death but to betrayal. And he hadn´t been ready to see the grief she had for him.

Of course, he had betrayed her. He promised her to stay a detective and not killing Makishima and he had broken both, even leaving her behind. This time without a letter.

_"It can be that she won´t be happy, but she will finally have the chance to be mad at you,"_ he heard Ginoza´s voice from yesterday in his head. And Kogami had to admit that if she would release her anger at him, be mad at him, want to knock his stuffing out, he would let her. After all, all her hatred towards him would be reasonable.

He ate breakfast and then walked around the living room floor like a cat. Akane was smart. Even if she was kidnapped or forced to flee, she would leave something, something that would help find her. Or something that would help her searchers understand why she was kidnapped, or why she had to flee. Even if it was not a letter, a note, but something more subtle. Like her own notes of her current situation, like a diary or a file. But then this diary or these files couldn´t just be put anywhere. It should be put in some place where someone would actually work hard for it to be seen.

Something in his head was trying to get his attention, but he wasn´t able to grab onto it. He only could when Inspector Shimotsuki Mika and Ginoza entered the safe house.

"Oi, Gino, is my apartment in the MWPSB still there?" he asked straightaway.

"No," Ginoza answered, frowning at the sudden question.

"And my belongings? Did someone pack them into boxes or were they burned, trashed or given away?"

"I have no idea why you are asking me this," he replied, sounding annoyed.

"When I departed, I left something here. And it held something addressed to Tsunemori. I think, if she left us any clues, it is possible that she left it at the same place as I did. Because she probably assumed that you would go after me first, with you thinking she went away, wanting to see me. If she did leave clues there, I could tell you where that spot is," Kogami explained. _After all I didn´t leave her nothing_, he thought in relief._ I´ve just almost forgotten it._

Ginoza crossed his arms in front of his chest. "This sounds a bit random to me."

"I don´t think so," Mika said. "I think she could have truly done this."

The Enforcer frowned at her. "Since when did you know her so well?"

"I don´t. But to me it sounds like something she would do. Also she was there when we put Kogami-san´s stuff into boxes."

Kogami turned to Mika. "Where did you put my things?"

"Ginoza-san took them all and... " Her face lit up. "... and took them to this house because he didn´t have that much place in his Enforcer's flat."

His lips crooked into a grin.

* * *

After Mika and Ginoza showed him where the boxes exactly were, they carried them into the living room.

"For what are we exactly going to search?" asked Ginoza when every box was in the living room.

"A book," Kogami told them. "_Swann´s Way_ by Marcel Proust, a hardcover."

"_Swann´s Way_?" Mika repeated. "I think I read it once when I was in school. Isn´t it the first installment of a series? Hm... Something with 'time'?"

"_Swann´s Way_,_ In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower_,_ The Guermantes Way_, _Sodom and Gomorrah_, _The Prisoner_, _The Fugitive_, and lastly, _Finding Time Again_ are the six books forming the_ In Search of Lost Time_ series, yes," Kogami answered, nodding.

"Of all things, why _Swann´s Way_?"

"'_Always try to keep a patch of sky above your life_'. It´s meaningful," he told her, his eyes serious.

"Enough unnecessary talking," Ginoza said. "Kogami has around one hundred books... "

"In fact, I have three hundred forty-seven books," Kogami dropped in.

"... and we have to find only one among this mess of boxes and books. So we should better start now," the Enforcer continued, glaring at his old friend.

Mika sighed.

* * *

"I can´t believe a single person could have so much books," Mika said, looking through box number twenty-seven. They had numbered every box, containing books, so they didn´t have to search through one twice. They also grouped the boxes for an easier search.

"I found _Finding Time Again_, but not _Swann´s Way_. I don´t even know half of these books. I know _The Picture of Dorian Gray_ and _1984_. Also _Gulliver´s Travels_. But what is _The Woman in White_?" She shook her head. "You could easily open your own library, Kogami-san"

"_The Woman in White_ is a mystery novel and the very first 'sensation novel'," Kogami told her, focused to search through box number fifty-three.

Mika looked up. "What is a 'sensation novel'?"

"I thought you attended Oso Academy," Ginoza said.

Kogami looked up to, frowning over the mess of boxes to the young Inspector. "Oso Academy? And you came to the Bureau three years ago? So you were there during the Oryo Rikako case?"

Mika´s brown eyes darkened. "Yes. In fact, my friend got killed by Oryo for her last sculpture, along with Yoshika."

"My bad."

"It was a long time ago, it´s okay. Also ‒ Oryo´s long dead."

Kogami briefly nodded. _Funahara Yuki got killed three years ago too. Did Tsunemori get over it, like Shimotsuki did?_ he thought, then dropped it and turned back to box fifty-three.

"It was a genre, popular in Great Britain during the 1860s and 1870s. It drew on gothic and romantic genres, along with melodramatic and Newgate novels, and notably followed the Industrial Revolution. Sensation novels also were somewhat abstract, following scenarios that wrestled with social anxieties of the Victorian era."

Mika, who also had turned back to her boxes, now twenty-eight, looked back up. "Huh?"

"You asked what sensation novels were. Here you have your answer."

"Oh... uh... thank you... "

After they looked through all seventy boxes, they still haven´t found _Swann´s Way_.

"I can´t believe it," Mika groaned. "It isn´t here. We did this for _nothing_." She stood up and stretched.

"You shouldn´t complain that much, Shimotsuki," Ginoza told her, glaring. "You´re the Inspector after all."

"But it_ was_ somewhat pointless..." she protested and wanted to add something as she suddenly frowned.

"I _think_ I know this _Swann´s Way_ from somewhere else than school," Mika said. "But I didn´t quite remember it. But now I_ do_." She turned to the others.

"On the day Ginoza-san, Akane-san and I packed everything you owned into boxes, Kogami-san, Akane-san picked something up as Ginoza-san left a room to bring the next box to the car. I was busy putting all the papers and files together and into some boxes, but I looked up for a moment and wondered that she wasn´t putting it away, but she flipped it open and began to read. Okay, there´s nothing unusual in reading a book, I thought and turned back to my work. But in the moment, I now realise, I looked up and saw Akane-san reading this book, I briefly glimpsed onto the cover and it said _Swann´s Way_"

Kogami pulled himself to his feet. "So you mean she didn´t put it back after she left her message in it, but... "

"... but she kept it," Mika continued, nodding. Ginoza rolled his eyes in annoyance.

* * *

Kogami Shinya had never been in Tsunemori Akane´s apartment. Until yet he didn't have a reason to visit her ‒ he had been an Enforcer back then. Enforcers could only leave the Bureau with an Inspector. Also she had never invited him. Still he had imagined how she lived ‒ what kinds of holograms lit up her walls and floors, what books filled her shelves, if she kept pictures of family and friends on her desk and so on. But as they arrived the next day at Akane´s apartment ‒ yesterday, it had been too late for anything ‒ everything was cold and dark because of the missing holograms.

Shimotsuki Mika turned the holograms on and the whole flat lit up ‒ Victor Horta´s Hotel Tassel, Kogami knew ‒ and a pink jellyfish appeared in front of them.

"Akane!" it cried out in joy. "You´re ba- " It cut off, blinking at them.

"Oh. Welcome Inspector Shimotsuki, Enforcer Ginoza and... " Its gaze turned to Kogami.

"Kogami Shinya, I was never here, so... ," he said, putting down the helmet.

"Kogami!" the jellyfish ‒ Candy was the name ‒ shouted and danced blissfully. "I know! I know! Akane talked about you a lot!"

He laid the helmet on a table and froze by the jellyfish´s words, but he didn´t respond to it. He just turned to Ginoza and Mika.

"Is everything like it was the day Tsunemori disappeared? Or did you rearrange things?"

Mika glared at him. "Everything is like she had left it, Kogami-san. We´re not _amateurs_"

The way she looked at him with this serious face let him smile for a second.

"Of course," he said.

* * *

Candy, the jellyfish, guided him to Akane´s bedroom. It was bright and the holograms were simply beautiful here. Her bed wasn´t made and her desk was messy too. Like every room in the apartment, this also had no fighting marks.

As Kogami went to the desk, Candy´s eyes followed him. He picked up a framed picture from the desk, slightly dusted. It showed a happily smiling Akane along with a even happier Funahara Yuki and another friend, he didn´t know, who just smiled lightly. It was nice seeing her like this ‒ with her slightly clumsy smile, all happy and safe. _Safe_. Suddenly his throat went dry.

"I thought you left the country," Candy said and Kogami flinched. He hadn´t expected it to speak to him all of sudden.

"She was all heart-broken as you left," it added, looking at Kogami who had put the picture back and turned to the jellyfish.

"Always wondered if you were okay, even had nightmares about you, screamed your name."

His back stiffened. _Screamed your name._

"I´m happy you´re finally back. So when she returns she will finally stop to cry."

"It could be that she wouldn´t be happy, but finally would have the chance to be mad at you."

"Do you know where Tsunemori kept her books? Especially a book named_ Swann´s Way_?" Kogami asked, wanting to stop the pink one to describe to him Akane´s despair, even if it was more than ridiculous for him to speak to a _jellyfish_.

"_Swann´s Way_?" It tilted his head. "She always looked onto the same page and always looked sad while doing it, but she never told me why. And Akane kept it under her pillow."

Kogami went to Akane´s messy bed and put his hand under her pillow. As he felt the familiar shape of a book, he grabbed it. Then he breathed deeply and flipped it open to the page he hid his message for Akane three years prior.

* * *

_The light made her hair seem lighter as it was, while colouring her skin golden and her eyes like amber, as she flipped the book open and thumbed through it._

_It had belonged, no, _belonged_ to Kogami Shinya. Today she, the new Inspector Shimotsuki Mika and Ginoza Nobuchika had put his old things away, cleaning his old Enforcer-apartment until there weren´t any marks left that someone had ever lived there. It had saddened her to see his old home so bare and cold. But the thought of the book in her bag had warmed her._

_Of course, she hadn´t any right to keep it. When Ginoza asked her if she wanted anything from Kogami´s things, she refused. She didn´t want anything which unnecessarily reminded her of her former partner, but this book was different. Because he solely left it for her._

_As Tsunemori Akane had entered his room along with Mika and Ginoza, she immediately noticed some differences: Papers were rearranged, some things gone, for example the picture of Kogami and Sasayama. It had sent her a stitch through her heart as she realised that he had been here for one last time before he left forever. And that he didn´t leave her any letter like the last time._

_But as she noticed this book, this book whose one page had a little, almost invisible, fold on the right corner, her heart had begun to warm up. She had already had some of his books in her hand and none of them had folds or scratches. So he had definitely put this fold on this page. He had done it in purpose. _He had done it in purpose.

_And with excitement running in her veins she had flipped the book open as she did now. With a sad smile on her lips she let her index finger of her right hand fly over the words Kogami had added for her._

_"It´s time for sleeping, Akane!" Candy yelled, turning the lights off, and Akane crawled under her blanket, the book pressed against her chest. And as she closed her eyes the words Kogami left her shone before her. Delicate, golden,_ beautiful_._

_"Now are the woods all black,_

_But still the sky is blue._

_And for thee,_

_My lady, my lady of the deepest of reds,_

_Red like purest blood, dried on the palest skin,_

_I offer the most genuine of apologies,_

_For me I´m solely a pollard and thou a queen"_

_"I take it," she whispered, falling asleep and not dreaming of a place where the sun shone brighter, the sky was bluer, the songs of the birds were lovelier, but of a place where they could meet again, when she could tell him her answer and he would never leave her again._

* * *

**The quote is by Marcel Proust but Shinya has already told you guys... so...**

**Also Shinya actually left "Swann's Way" on the deck of the ship he used to flee. I kind of mixed it up with "he left it in his room before he left". Sorry. But let us just think that he had two copies and took one with him which he left on the ship and left the second one for Akane in his room, okay? Okay?**

**Yeah, I know. The "poem" is terrible. The first two lines are from "Swann's Way" the next five are by me.**

**"Pollard" is the archaic word for "an animal that has lost its horns or cast its antlers", by the way, and I thought that it would fit...**

**Also "_italic_"-passages are always passages set in the past!**

**The next chapter will come... probably in December or January. It depends.**

**And because of those huge gaps between the chapters I decided to do little "previews" for every chapter to span the time.**

**~Preview~**

~1~

_"It´s easier to get killed than to disappear"_, he suddenly remembered the words Kagari Shusei said once during the Talisman Case and slightly shivered over it. _Hopefully, this is not the case for Tsunemori __‒__ is it?._

~2~

"I thought Gino took all my things", Kogami said, looking over to his old friend.

~3~

"Not for Inspector Tsunemori", Mika said. "I will ask Inspector Kahara of Division Three then because of these cases"

~4~

_Her hands shook as she put the report down which she secretly copied today. Another odd case._

~5~

She leaned back. She needed a plan to go back.

~6~

He remembered her, the little twenty-year-old girl on her first day of work. The large brown eyes, the short brown hair. Her skin had been pale. But she could look totally different today.

**~Preview~**

**Interpret away! :)**

**Six little sneak peaks. I think the number of sneak peaks will variate and sometimes I will reveal the chapter's name and sometimes not...**

**All the sneak peaks will be in the next chapter - probably a bit fixed by Aruu -, also they are in order. This time. The next time they couldn't...**

**:)**

**Inspector Kahara isn't a canon character, by the way.**

**And Mika will get more "screen time" when she goes to Division Three. And she_ is_ more helpful than Canon-Mika, I would have never guessed that Canon-Mika is so... yeah, you hopefully know what I mean. Even if I don't like Canon-Mika, I loved her for **

_***spoiler for Season 2 Episode 5* **_

**investigating after Sakuya. (I always knew that he was evil and I was sooo happy because of it in the last episode. I hope he dies a horrible death.) **

_***spoiler end***_

**Oh, and before I forget it... Hola anonimo. Gracias por tu crítica. Aprendo español en la escuela y espero que mi español no este horrible. Pues mi instiuto tiene un colegio hermanado en Colombia :) ¡Ojalá que te guste mi historia!**

**See you guys until the next chapter!**

**Momo**

_**\- currently working on "Criminally Asymptomatic" at the first place, but didn't forget about "Next" and working on its twelfth chapter**_


	7. No Light, No Light

**It's time for uploads! :D**

**The nice Aruu has finished her beta-read by Sunday but I have been just a bit too lazy to upload it already... sorry.**

**However, she did a great job and I'm really thankful that she's doing this for me.^^**

**(Texts in _italic_ are _always_ past-events.)**

**And now: Enjoy reading!**

* * *

**Chapter Six:**

**No Light, No Light**

_"You can't choose what stays and what fades away."_

* * *

Kogami ran his finger over the words he had added back then. The ink around his words were blurred and told him that she had cried over these words. Then he took the piece of paper she had put between the pages and closed the book before he returned it to its place under her pillow. Candy followed him as he joined Mika and Ginoza in Akane´s living room.

He waved the piece of paper. "Found it," he said and then handed it to Mika.

"It´s only an address," she frowned, passing the note to Ginoza.

"Exactly," Kogami replied and picked up his helmet. "And we are going to go there now."

* * *

Akane´s little safe house was nothing more than a little and unimpressive flat, a bit outside of the city. A bit like her own appearance: small, fragile, wide-eyed. Nobody would think that Tsunemori Akane with her delicate body would be an Inspector or one of the most reckless and impressive persons Kogami knew. The first time he saw her, he thought she would be just some little girl who could never be capable to be a detective due to shyness and missing faith in herself. But he had been proved wrong. She was more than suited for this job. Even if she didn´t have so much faith in herself and her appearance misleading, she was strong and quite skilled. Kogami had never thought they would find Makishima and him in so little time. No one could say anything else other than that Akane really improved from her first day at work.

When Mika turned the holograms on, the flat was still cold. The walls were now painted all in black, narrow grey stripes in huge intervals rising from the ground to the top, all over the black wall. The floor seemed to be made of dark wood and the lights filled everything with sickening pale-white light. Kogami couldn´t believe Akane choose this as her little secret place. But probably because of this she did: nobody would guess this little, dark apartment was hers.

They skimmed through the rooms. One was completely empty, one was a small kitchen, another one seemed to be a living room full of boxes and papers. Here, the holograms didn´t fill the walls and floor, revealing that everything was in fact dark grey. A large sofa and a small table were the only pieces of furniture, surrounded by boxes, files, papers... The wall opposite the door was also full of notes and reminded Kogami of his own apartment in his Bureau.

"Wow. Seems as Akane-san secretly worked on a case," Mika saying the thoughts of them all aloud.

Ginoza stepped into the room, grabbing a file from the sofa.

"I can´t believe Tsunemori would do something like this," he said, already seeing through the file.

Mika and Kogami also stepped in. Mika knelt in front of a box.

"Half of the food in the cupboards and the fridge were already ruined. Akane-san didn´t return to this place for a long time. So we don´t have to seek for hidden clues, right?" Mika asked, ripping the box open because it was strangely sealed and not marked like the others.

Kogami picked up a pile of papers. "Even if this is right, it could be that Tsunemori left some clues in advance, in case she disappears."

_"It´s easier to get killed than to disappear,"_ he suddenly remembered the words Kagari Shusei said once during the Talisman Case and slightly shivered over it. _Hopefully, this is not the case for Tsunemori ‒ is it?_

He heard Mika sighing.

"Huh?" she said then. "What´s this?"

Ginoza and Kogami looked up and he immediately recognised the old grey coat Mika was holding up. After all, there had been a time this had been his.

"I thought Gino took all my things," Kogami said, looking over to his old friend. "Or was I fed with false information?"

Ginoza shook his head. "No. I... I gave Tsunemori the coat."

Kogami lifted an eyebrow.

"I thought she wanted something from you, even if she said otherwise," Ginoza said. "I never imagined that she would put it in a box and seal it, so she wouldn´t have to see it anymore."

"When did you become so sentimental, Gino?" Kogami asked, going to Mika to take the coat. Its material felt soft under his fingers, but cold and untouched.

Ginoza turned away. "As I told you we grew closer."

Kogami gave him another look, but as he still avoided him, he just laid the coat onto the sofa and went back to the pile of papers.

"These are all simple cases of natural death," Ginoza said after a while. "Nothing unusual. Heartaches, long life... " He shook his head. "Division Three had the responsibility to investigate all this 'cases', because the dependants couldn´t believe that they were actually dead. But there isn´t that much to investigate when someone just died those ways. I can´t believe that these cases are so important for Tsunemori."

"Probably she found something odd in these cases," Mika suggested. "She always had a natural intuition for these kinds of things."

"I agree," Kogami said. "Tsunemori wouldn´t spend her time with such trivial stuff like this. Also she wouldn´t have never got into trouble because of_usual deaths_." He looked over to Ginoza. "Do you know if the deceased had some kind of connection?"

Again, he shook his head. "I have no idea. As I said, this was Division Three´s responsibility, not Division One´s. I just know that the members of Division Three were kind of annoyed because of these 'cases', because they weren´t actual cases."

"Not for Akane-san," Mika said. "I will ask Inspector Kahara of Division Three about these cases."

"Yes, you should," Kogami nodded. "And I think we don´t have to search for anything here anymore. Everything Tsunemori collected is about these Division Three cases."

* * *

_For her, these cases had always been nothing but odd._

_Dimness filled the room and, in fact, the whole apartment. She didn´t mind. Her eyesight had always been very good. Also she had accustomed herself to this dim light in the last months._

_Her hands shook as she put the report down which she secretly copied today. Another odd case. Another victim of her nameless enemy. And she would be the next._

_She got to her feet quickly. She would be the next. She would be the next one to die. The report confirmed this. Her nameless enemy knew it. He or she knew what nobody else knew. And this would be her end._

_But she would never give up or run away. She had a duty, she had a job. She had to fulfill it. Just because she would be the next victim on her enemy´s long list didn´t mean she should be scared and go into hiding. Even if she would be the last one in the line._

_She had time. Her enemy didn´t know everything as she did as well. But one of the things she knew was that she had time. Because he or she didn´t kill in such short intervals._

_She hated herself for having taken so long to understand the deeper meaning of these cases. Even if she didn´t know the whole story behind everything or the culprit´s identity, she knew his or her pattern or why he or she chose these people as victims._

_If she had realised it earlier, she would've had more time. But now she didn't have it anymore. Her time was running away. And if her timer finally stopped, this wouldn´t just be her own end._

* * *

She hated it.

Akane had gotten more time as she ran away. But she couldn´t go back. Not now. Even if she saw the culprit´s face.

It deviled her that she could do nothing. That she had to hide. Oh, she never felt so useless before. But if she would go now, the culprit would kill her immediately. And this time for good. Her death would mean the end of her enemy´s path of revenge.

Akane looked through the window, but she couldn´t see anything because eventually someone built a wall exactly on the other side of the window. She hadn´t seen light in the last few months. No real light. The light of the single bulb which hung naked on the ceiling was a pale white which gave her a sick feeling.

She leaned back. She needed a plan to go back. To face the culprit. To bring her enemy down. Akane knew that she could just go and tell everybody everything. But that would mean that she had to reveal her secret. And if her secret would be revealed...

Akane closed her eyes. She had made a promise. Okay, not exactly a promise. And because of the sake of this promise she couldn´t do it. Because of that she needed another plan. A plan where she wouldn't have to reveal her secret.

But until she had one, she had to hide and ask herself when she could see the light again.

* * *

He hated it.

Kogami had gotten more clues about her disappearance and still he wandered in darkness about her whereabouts. She could be dead now and he wouldn´t know. Probably would never.

Tomorrow Mika and Ginoza would go ask this Inspector Kahara - he didn´t know her‒ about these cases Akane was interested in. With the information they would gain tomorrow they could get closer to the solution. But they wouldn´t.

They weren´t sure if they would get information and if the ones they would get would be helpful.

Suddenly he hated the fact that he had killed Makishima Shogo. If he hadn't done it, he would probably still have been an Enforcer under Akane. And then she wouldn´t probably be gone. She would still be there, because he wouldn´t allow her to disappear. But he had killed Makishima and left Japan, leaving Akane behind.

Kogami closed his eyes and tried to reminisce. It had been long time ago when he had last seen her. The picture of her and her friends he had seen yesterday were also three years old.

He remembered her, the little twenty-year-old girl on her first day of work. The large brown eyes, the short brown hair. Her skin had been pale. But she could totally look different today. And he could probably never know how she looked now.

He could remember the day she had shouted at Ginoza. The day when they had gone to the tattooed man. When they had hunted Makishima in the NONA Tower and she had been shot in the leg. When he had woken up, finding her by his side. When she had been clinging to the back of the truck. When his heart stopped beating for a second. And when he strained himself he could hear her voice in his head. But not her laughter. He had never heard her laugh.

He remembered himself writing the "farewell" letter to her. How he had done it over and over again to find the right words. And still didn´t in the end.

He could see the stern look in Akane´s large eyes when she had told him she wanted to bring Makishima down too, because she wanted to avenge Yuki as he wanted to avenge Sasayama. And he could hear her crying when she still couldn´t kill Makishima.

When he thought about it, he didn´t even know her. Kogami didn´t know her favourite colour, or what she loved to eat the most. Why she couldn´t swim or why she had decided to be a detective. He knew nothing about her hobbies, her interests, her family. Nothing. Everything he remembered about Tsunemori Akane was their work together. And when Akane would die... if she was dead already... everything about her would fade away. And slowly his memories would do this too. And she would be dead for real. But he didn´t want her to die or to fade away. He wanted her to be safe.

Kogami kept his eyes closed, not wanting to see the light flushing though the windows.

* * *

**The quote is a line of "No Light, No Light" - a song by Florence and the Machine. Because of this, I have chosen this chapter name.:)**

**Did you see the trailer for the movie? It's great and _full of spoilers_. Who doesn't like spoilers, shouldn't watch the trailer.**

**(I still can't believe that they have released such a trailer while Season 2 is still airing. I mean... they showed not only Akane as characters but other too, we know or not know. And this reveals pretty much who will live and who will die by the end of Season 2.)**

**However... I have no idea when the next chapter comes. (Probably in January?)**

**And because of that I have a few more snippets and teasers for you again...**

**~Preview~**

~1~

She entered the tower and walked to Division One´s office. When she entered Moriwaki Naoki looked up at her and smiled, his dark brown eyes shining, as he stood up and walked towards her. He was the only one in the office.

~2~

"We know that you and Inspector Akane share are a little secret you try to keep away from us and Shimotsuki."

~3~

"Inspector Shimotsuki, Enforcer Ginoza, why do I have the pleasure of meeting the two of you?" Kohara said in the melodic voice of hers.

~4~

Ginoza looked over her shoulders and frowned. "I skimmed through this report three or four months ago, but I can´t remember this."

~5~

_"I´m a friend of your sister and I need your help."_

**~Preview~**

**Interpret away. :)**

**(_Italic_ = past; past = in-story timeline - two or less months ago)**

**Also, I have published a story called "Letters" which is set in the "Next"-Universe. :D The story is meant to help bridging the time until the next "Next" chapters. But of course, I won't forget about "Next"! I finally finished chapter 12 and just rewrite some parts of the other chapters, fix stuff etc., before I go and write chapter 13 which will be incredibly hard to write because it's a... I don't know what it is.**

**Okay, enough.**

**Until next time!**

**Momo**

_**\- currently working on the stuff listed above**_


	8. Remain Nameless

**Finally it's time for another chapter!**

**(And it's such a silly one... )**

**Okay, however, I hope you all had a nice start into the new year and yeah... I hope you like this chapter.**

**(I also want to thank Aruu again for correcting my very silly mistakes patiently (and they are _really_ silly) and changing words when I choose the wrong one. Thanks.)**

**And now: Enjoy (and review if you want)!**

* * *

**Chapter Seven:**

**Remain Nameless**

_"You can call me anything you want."_

* * *

Even after working for the Ministry of Welfare's Public Safety Bureau for so many years, Shimotsuki Mika still found that the Bureau's tower was somewhat... scary.

The MWPSB Tower rose into the sky like a skyscraper and the top of it vanished in the clouds. She doubted that someone had ever seen the top of it from the ground. When she had arrived here for the first time, she had been just seventeen years old. She could still remember how everything seemed so big for her. After her friend's death she had struggled to keep her Psycho-Pass clear and pass all the exams to become an Inspector of the Bureau. It had been a long and rocky road and every day she had thought she couldn't do it anymore, couldn't bear everything anymore. Tsunemori Akane had always been strangely successful in keeping her Crime Coefficient low, but Mika had never been. For her it was something out of the impossible. During the time she took her exams ‒ she even got her teachers and parents to let her do them earlier than usual ‒ she tried to go to sleep early, eat healthy and always get some time off to prevent her Psycho-Pass from rising. Still she had woken up in the middle of night, shivering and sweating, because she had dreamed about the sculpture of Kagami and Yoshika. There hadn't been one day she didn't think of them and Oryo Rikako. But in the end she had done it. With a Psycho-Pass of seventy-eight and a quite high number of points in her exams she got assigned at the Public Safety Bureau like she had always wanted after Kagami's death.

Mika's hands had been shaking and her heart had nearly been jumping out of her chest as she had first entered the tower. And shortly after her assignment she got her first case and had to hurry to the rest of her new team which had been already there. Akane had paired her with Ginoza Nobuchika and Kunizuka Yayoi, and Ginoza had lectured her all the way to the subject. After some time she had become annoyed of his words and got herself separated. Even if it had been her first day of work and Akane had said she couldn't be treated like a newbie, Ginoza still had done it! Heavily annoyed because of the former Inspector, Mika had tried to go after the subject on her own which had resulted in her getting almost killed by the subject. Kunizuka had had to save her with the Dominator. It had been her first day of work and she nearly got herself killed! She had been really depressed because of that, but Akane had just laughed and said it was okay. Ginoza could really be annoying sometimes. She just had to prevent her temper to break out and just listen to him, because he just wanted to help after all. The old Ginoza, Akane had told her, would have meant everything he had said and would never help her, but the new one would. So Mika had just nodded. Even if he kept lecturing her.

Her first day had been rocky and troublesome, but Akane had been so friendly to her and Karanomori had told her she just needed practise and patted her on her shoulders. Kunizuka had been silent, but it hadn't been the detesting kind of silence which had filled Mika with relief. Only Ginoza had been strict with her and even tried to yell at her if Akane hadn't managed to drag him back and calm down.

Akane had always been such a nice and friendly woman, so strong and intelligent. And since her very first day she had been Mika's hero, her role model. She had gotten along with the others so well and never thought of a single dark thought.

That she secretly worked on a case on her own and even got herself in serious trouble had been quite the shock for Mika.

She entered the tower and walked to Division One's office. When she entered, Moriwaki Naoki looked up at her and smiled, his dark brown eyes shining as he stood up and walked towards her. He was the only one in the office.

"Finally," he said. "I almost thought we all got a day off and I just didn't know."

Mika put her bag next to her desk.

"Ginoza's also on duty today," she shrugged. "Don't know why he isn't here already."

Naoki shook his head, his light brown hair whirling around. "Akane-san's missing and Ginoza takes his chance to be late without getting in trouble."

She looked straight into his eyes. "I'm also an Inspector if you have forgotten," she glared. "_I_ can also yell at Ginoza for being late."

His mouth formed a grin. "You're twenty, Mika-chan. He's already thirty-one. He won't listen to you, even if you're not as tiny as Akane-san."

He only called her "Mika-chan" when no one was around, not even if it was Akane. Akane also called her by her first name and so did Karanomori Shion, the analyst, but out of Naoki's mouth her own name always sounded strange to her own ears. Karanomori and Akane indeed called her name in a friendly manner, but Naoki said it... differently. More close, more personal. Still it didn't prevent her from scowling at him.

"Akane-san was nineteen when she got assigned."

"Twenty," he corrected. "She had been three years older than you back then and it didn't take her a year to find herself a quite prestigious position in the Division and the entire Bureau. And you're still a newbie, Mika-chan. You have to hold on."

Naoki looked down at her ‒ she was tall, but not huge like Naoki ‒ and in his gaze laid something... cordial. But before she could reply anything, Ginoza entered the office and they both turned to him.

"Sorry that I'm late," he said and glared at Mika. "We have work to do, Inspector Shimotsuki, do you remember?"

Oh. Of course. How could she have forgotten?

"What kind of work?" Naoki frowned.

"Work for the case of Inspector Tsunemori Akane's disappearance," Mika explained.

"Oh, yes," he nodded energetically. "The last days you have worked together in this case, haven't you? And you got clues? That's fantastic! I quite miss Inspector Akane."

Now it was Ginoza's time to frown. "Please?"

"Do I speak Chinese? I said I miss Akane-san. Since her disappearance you seemed to have forgotten your own position and command Inspector Shimotsuki like hell, _Enforcer_ Ginoza." He scowled at him. Naoki rarely scowled.

Ginoza glared back. Naoki was around twenty centimeters taller than himself and still he didn't feel uncomfortable. Mika, however, would.

"I hope you know that I was an Inspector once, Moriwaki," he said, his voice harsh. "And that I have more experience than the both of you. Also, I'm the closest to Inspector Tsunemori."

"Because you knew her the longest," Naoki barked back. "Along with Yayoi. And because you both have this little secret which holds you together and makes you 'close.'"

Mika's eyes widened and Ginoza whitened. She never saw him doing something like this.

Naoki grinned wickedly. "I'm right, am I not? Yayoi, Shion and I know this, Ginoza. We know that you and Inspector Akane share are a little secret you try to keep away from us and Shimotsuki. But you_ failed_, you have to know. You both failed. Okay, not Akane-san. But you. You're a terrible liar. Even if we don't know what exactly your little secret is, we know that you have one. And that Akane-san is the only one who knows too. Just the two of you. Every time you both go out for 'lunch' you go somewhere else, don't you? She was just your little ticket to get to your 'secret', wasn't she? You both were even gone during nights! Your secret has to do something with something outside and because you're an Enforcer you can only get out of this facility with an Inspector. But now Akane-san's gone and you can't go there anymore! You never liked her anyway! You just search for her so she can take you out again like the little dog you are!"

It looked like Ginoza wanted to kill Naoki immediately, not caring about the rules. Not caring that he could be sealed away into some kind of mental health care facility forever. He just wanted to kill his fellow Enforcer, wanted to rip out his tongue and tear him to pieces. But before he could do this or anything else, Mika took him by the sleeve and dragged him out, leaving Naoki behind.

She dragged him along the whole floor to Division Three's office, but before they entered, she let his sleeve go and looked sternly at him

"I know that Naoki's words are upsetting you," she started. "But we have to ask Inspector Kohara now about the cases and I want you to calm down and look as bored and smart-aleck as usual, do you understand? I don't care about your little secret or that I didn't have a clue about it, or even if Enforcer Naoki finds that you just want to have Akane-san back in sake of your little secret. I just want you to keep your mind clean and help me find her, okay? This is your duty as an Enforcer, do you understand? And I want you to fulfill it."

Mika had never talked to him like that but Akane was gone now and someone had to rebuke Ginoza Nobuchika. Also it felt quite good.

His gaze rested on her for a moment before he nodded and with a smile on her lips, Mika turned and entered Division Three's office.

Their office greatly resembled the office of Division One, full of desks, plans, chairs... Some personal stuff. But they had fewer desks due to having just two Enforcers and an Inspector. Mika couldn't see any of Inspector Kohara's Enforcers, just the Inspector herself. As she saw the two of them enter, she stood up, a bright, friendly smile all over her face.

With her lovely dark brown eyes, perfectly straight glossy black hair and nicely shaped face, Kohara Kagami could only be described as "beautiful." Even if she always wore those ugly tops with collars, covering her throat completely. Oryo Rikako had been called beautiful back then, but Oryo Rikako had been nothing in comparison with Kohara Kagami.

That she shared her first name with her late friend, however, gave Mika always the creeps.

"Inspector Shimotsuki, Enforcer Ginoza, why do I have the pleasure of meeting the two of you?" Kohara said in the melodic voice of hers.

_Find the right words_, Mika told herself. _She isn't allowed to find out about Kogami or about the new clues about the Akane case. Choose wisely, Shimotsuki._

"Hello, Inspector Kohara. I hope we wouldn't bother you if we asked you for a favour?"

She smiled. "I see. What kind of favour?"

_Choose wisely._

"We got a case a few days ago and found out that they collide with some old cases of yours," Mika lied. Ginoza was a terrible liar but she had always been one of the good ones. Her parents had never liked this talent of hers, but she had been always proud of it.

"Oh, do they?" Kohara asked, still smiling. In fact, she was smiling all the time. Mika barely saw her not smiling.

She nodded.

Kohara clapped her hands together. "Well," she said. "You can have our files for your investigation, Inspector Shimotsuki, Enforcer Ginoza." Then she went to her computer and searched for the right files. Shortly after finding the right ones, Dayama Wataru entered the office.

Mika barely knew Dayama Wataru. She only knew what everyone knew: that he was an Inspector of the MWPSB, the only one of Division Five. Nobody knew anything else about him, not even his Enforcers. Mika and the others of the Bureau even doubted that Chief Kasei knew more than they did.

When you met Inspector Dayama in the corridors you usually turned away your gaze as discreet as you could, because he always looked angry and dangerous and nobody knew what he was thinking all the time. Also, nobody knew how a scary person like Dayama Wataru could have possibly become an Inspector. He wouldn't even fit as an Enforcer.

Or as latent criminal.

They usually avoided Dayama, so Mika had never been to him so close. She struggled with herself not to shudder as he turned his gaze to her and Ginoza, his sharp jade-green eyes glaring at his scarred face. Someday he had probably been handsome but today he was just a single scar. Scars ran all over his head and arms ‒ he barely even had hair. Most of his scars weren't deep, they were small and fine. Except one. One scar ran from his forehead all over his left eye and all the way down to his chin. It was a really deep scar and it always gave Mika the creeps whenever she imagined how he had possibly got it.

She didn't want to know.

Dayama took his gaze away from them and turned to Kohara.

"Do you have a minute, Inspector Kohara?" he asked in the deep voice of his.

Kohara smiled back at him, not even a bit scared. "Of course." She turned to Mika. "Shimotsuki-san, I already have picked the files out. You can read them, but please let them on my computer, if this doesn't bother you... ? No? Fantastic. And now excuse me. I have to talk a bit with Inspector Dayama."

Then she followed Dayama and left the office. Mika blinked after them, wondering why Dayama wanted to speak to her and then went to Kohara's computer.

Ginoza already found himself a chair and the next minutes they spent looking through the files. Like Ginoza said in Akane's safe house, the cases Akane was interested in were just... trivial. Nothing special, nothing unusual. Usual deaths of people whose dependents just didn't want to except their sudden deaths and alerted the Bureau. A little girl, around ten years old, got killed by a car due to the driver having been attracted by something. A woman in her twenties tripped over her ridiculously high heels and fell down a staircase. An old man died due to a heart attack. A teenage boy accidentally killed himself when he played with the hologram system of his home. A man in his fifties left the town and went on holiday in the countryside where he got eaten by some kind of wild animal. Another woman accidentally switched some tablets and killed herself due to her mistake. And a pair of twins, both male, accidentally blew themselves up.

Nothing unusual, nothing suspicious. Just a bunch of ridiculous deaths.

And still Akane found something strange in the pattern of their deaths. Ginoza contacted Karanomori and asked her to find some kind of connection between these people, but she couldn't find one. It wasn't like they all belonged to one and the same family, to the same family of unlucky fellows. Or that the twins and the woman who stumbled went to the same university or something like that. They had no connection to the others.

What the hell did Akane see in these cases? Which inconsistencies? Mika didn't know and judging from the look of Ginoza, he had no idea either.

"Huh?"

Mika read the paragraph again. _The street scanners saw someone with a Psycho-Pass of 67 in the same street, just three minutes before the victim got killed. It was the only person being recognised by the scanners in the period of the victim's death, but his Crime Coefficient and Hue couldn't be attached for some point._

Ginoza looked over her shoulders and frowned. "I skimmed through this report three or four months ago, but I can't remember this."

She craned her head and glanced at him. "Do you think someone deleted this from the official version of the report, so no one else would read it? And that this is the thing Akane-san found suspicious?"

He nodded.

"It's the only possibility," he said. "and the only clue we have."

"A Psycho-Pass number without an owner," Mika thought aloud. "So this means Akane-san hunted a nameless possible culprit?"

Ginoza scowled. "This means that we have to hunt for a nameless enemy, someone who has no other data than his Psycho-Pass, in order to find Inspector Tsunemori Akane."

* * *

_She pulled her cap further into her face and adjusted her sunglasses. Even if there weren't any street scanners in the area, there could be still the possibility that someone could recognise her. And then not solely the whole mission but her life would come to an end. And if she died, there would be nobody anymore who could stop her nameless enemy._

_Tsunemori Akane had never been a fan of trousers but now she had to for making her costume complete. She was wearing sunglasses which didn't limit her field of vision, a pair of dark jeans, high heels, a floral blouse and a white thin jacket over it which she kept open. Also, she wore earrings and a necklace and had even used more makeup than usual. Some days ago she had bought extensions for her hair she had glued on her actual hair with great effort as she had never done something like this. The cap she wore on her head was, in fact, a beret and helped her to feel even more stupid._

It's only for a short period of time_, Akane told herself and kept walking through the streets, carefully evading the street scanners. The people around her didn't mind Akane. However, sometimes some people turned towards her, skimmed her and then walked onward. Nobody had ever looked after her when she walked through the streets. But then she was actually a more inconspicuous woman._

_After a while, she finally arrived at the little house which stood slightly squashed between two larger houses. It really looked pitiful._

_Akane took a deep breath and tucked her hair behind her ears. She wasn't used to long hair. Then she walked towards the house and knocked on the door. Even if she was told that the resident of this house was a genius mechanist and the house was full of robots, holograms and his creations, she could knock on the door without concern because the house didn't possess any scanners._

_She waited patiently and felt her hair being blown by the wind and probably looked like some kind of cape now. Then finally, the door opened. A man in his thirties looked at her. His black hair was messy and he looked at her with bored brown eyes. He wore a terribly buttoned white shirt and looked pretty sleepy. He looked a lot like his little sister, despite the fact that she had dyed her hair long time ago._

_"How can I help you?" he asked and examined her. His voice smelled like coffee._

_Akane smiled a friendly smile. "Are you Karanomori Takuma? I'm a friend of your sister ‒ Karanomori Shion ‒ and I need your help."_

* * *

**Like the last chapter, the chapter's name comes from a song from Florence and the Machine which is called - who would have guessed? - "Remain Nameless." The quote is also a line of the song.**

**It still fascinates me how different I imagined Mika before Season 2 came out...**

**~Preview~**

~1~

"And I would never be friends with someone who killed Tanaka Botan´s pet rabbit after he had sneaked to the teachers that some boy with greasy black hair and grey eyes walked all other Yamamoto-sensei´s beloved flowers."

~2~

"When we´re finding Inspector Tsunemori, she will kill you."

"I´m hearing that quite a lot lately."

~3~

Oh, God, what should she do if they killed each other?

~4~

"I thought you would be more... I don´t know... _ugly_."

~5~

"Nobu?"

**~Preview~**

**Okay. That were the previews... and while choosing them I realised that the next chapter is just... ridiculous. But, yeah. "Calm before the big clash," right?**

**Okay, interpret away. :) (Who says what? This time's preview edition: only quotes! **(With exception of the third one. (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻ ) **Who can match the quote to the character? :D )**

**We will see us in... I don't know. Probably February.**

**Also, you can now see this stories's (and my other stories's) progress on my profile. If it interests you.**

**Bye, then!**

**Momo**

_**\- surprisingly didn't have much to say today** (probably because she still waits for the DAMN MOVIE TO COME OUT AND SHE REALLY HAS NO PATIENCE WITH SUCH THINGS, DAMMIT.)_


	9. Killer on the Loose

**Yey. Finally a new chapter.**

**It took ages - I was busy, my great beta-reader Aruu was busy. Things happen.**

**But now here's the long-awaited (hopefully) next chapter!**

**I hope you enjoy it!**

* * *

**Chapter Eight:**

**Killer on the Loose**

_"There's a killer on the loose again_  
_A killer on the loose_  
_There's a killer on the loose again."_

* * *

Mika awaited for his reaction. In the last thirty minutes, they had told Kogami Shinya everything they got to know: the circumstances of every death, the missing connections between the deceased and the nameless enemy. The whole time, he had been silent, which had made her itchy inside. Why didn't he talk? Why didn't he ask any questions? Why wasn't he talking _now_?

If she had been in his place, she would have already talked and asked and everything. His silence just crept her out ‒ and he was already scary enough. Again she asked herself how someone like him could have become friends with the lovely Akane. For her this was just a mystery ‒ and her very own case.

She looked over to Ginoza discreetly. With his usual slightly bored face, he looked at Kogami, saying nothing. But today, she had realised that he had been a bit..._nervous_. He always looked at his bracelet, checking the time. And one time Mika had caught him being phoned by someone, but he turned the call down without even glancing at it. And if she thought about everything, she would have to say that he had been like that for quite a long time...

Mika slightly frowned, not wanting someone to notice and then being asked. Was this connected to the little secret Ginoza and Akane shared? Or was the reason of his nervousness another one?

"I see," Kogami finally said, breaking Mika out of her thoughts.

"It's a bit like back then when everyone wore these helmets, but back then the Hues could have been attached."

She had read everything about the case with the helmets ‒ and the last one of them was used by Kogami Shinya, former Enforcer of Division One. In fact, the Ministry of Welfare had said they would do something against the usage of these helmets, but after they were destroyed and it had been made sure that there weren't any plans somewhere, they hadn't done any program for the scanners and the Dominators in the end. No one would have suggested that one of those helmets could be used again someday.

If you forgot about the fact that Kogami was a fugitive, had lost simply everything and that one of his former colleagues was missing now, you could call him a really lucky guy.

"After we had read all the reports, Shimotsuki and I went to Tsunemori's safe house," Ginoza told Kogami. "There we found some interesting notes of hers, but there aren't any exact notes about her, and now our, nameless enemy." He pulled out a folder from the inside pockets of his jacket and handed it to Kogami. He took it and quickly looked through it.

"Even though Tsunemori's notes are numerous, she took care not to write everything down. Probably she didn't want to chronicle too much about her knowledge, because she feared that if someday, someone found her notes, they would know everything she knew and would have a easy way to track her down," Ginoza continued.

Kogami nodded, looking up from the folder.

"She was always quite careful when she wasn't in one of her incredibly reckless phases."

Did Mika just see a little curl at the end of his mouth?

"Still, there aren't any notes about her nameless enemy, just questions like _'Why did he or she select these people? Is there a reason behind his or her murders or did he or she just kill them for enjoyment?'_ And still she found out that much about the nameless one that he or she went after Tsunemori, in order to keep her mouth shut", he continued. Kogami gazed over to Mika. "And what does that mean?"

She frowned. Was he really questioning her? No, was he really _testing_ her? He had to test her. He couldn't be serious with this question. He just wanted to see how far her abilities reached.

"She didn't have any time," Mika finally said, keeping her voice calm. "It seems that she found out quite a lot, that the nameless killer went after her to silence her, but Akane-san found these information out, right before she disappeared. Because of that, she never had any time to write anything down which could help us. Akane-san searched and searched, but the search was hard and painful, because it is unusual that no name matches with a Crime Coefficient, so she only got the information she needed and searched for, right before her disappearance. But probably she did some kind of mistake and the nameless one found out that she searched for him or her and tried to silence Akane-san and probably even succeeded or just forced her to flee and hide."

Kogami nodded and she relaxed. If Naoki was here, he would have patted her on the back, congratulating her on her conclusion.

Oh, yes. Naoki.

Mika cleared her throat. "Kogami-san, before I forget, I want to say that, like we requested, Ginoza-san and I took the other Enforcers of our Division with us this time."

She looked over to Ginoza. He nodded and then wandered off to bring the other Enforcers in. Kunizuka Yayoi walked into the living room, her long black hair flying behind her. Moriwaki Naoki followed her, big, with broad shoulders, hands in pockets and a grin all over his face. While the delicate Kunizuka was always like an ice queen, the tall and heavy Naoki grinned through his life.

"It has been a long time, Kunizuka," Kogami said and the black haired woman turned towards him.

"So, what they said was true," she said. "You're back in Tokyo."

He nodded. "Apparently."

She glared at him. "You left a great bunch of trouble."

"I know."

"Once we find Inspector Tsunemori, she will kill you."

"I'm hearing that quite a lot lately."

Kunizuka shrugged. "Just a warning, because you're finally back."

Kogami nodded again. "I know."

"So you're Kogami Shinya, the former Enforcer of Division One, the best and probably only friend of Gino and the one who troubles Inspector Tsunemori?" Naoki said, stepping in front of him, frowning.

"I assume so," Kogami answered and his voice sounded a bit _bitter_ for Mika's ears.

"I thought you would be more... I don't know..._ugly_. I mean Akane-san always looks like she's about to vomit all over the office when someone starts to talk about you. And you _are_ Gino's only friend... "

Ginoza glared over at Naoki, but he didn't mind. Mika hoped that they wouldn't kill each other when they got back at the tower.

Kogami chuckled, to Mika's surprise. "Let us see... " He craned his head towards Ginoza. "Oy, are we friends, Ex-Inspector Ginoza?"

Mika turned to Ginoza, so she could see his face when he would answer. What would his answer be?

Something flickered in the Enforcer's eyes. "Me, a friend with some filthy fugitive like you? I greatly doubt that."

"Good, because I wouldn't be friends with someone who said Enforcers were filthy dogs just three years ago, back when I was one."

"Perfect, because no one wants to be friends with someone who wore the same old coat for more than ten years."

"And no one would want to befriend someone who always got the second place in competitions."

"And I would never be friends with someone who killed Tanaka Botan's pet rabbit after he had sneaked to the teachers that some boy with greasy black hair and grey eyes walked all over Yamamoto-sensei's beloved flowers."

"And I could never be friends with a person who came off with something like that, after Tanaka Botan had sneaked to the teachers that some boy with girl-like long hair searched for treasures in his nose in the middle of the school's library."

"It would be more than just ridiculous, to be friends with some idiot who didn't even know how long a rabbit could last in water with his head down."

"And I could never be friends with someone who enjoys seeing some little girl crying."

Mika's eyes widened. Did Kogami just say that what she thought he had?

For a moment both men just looked at each other with dark gazes and Mika hoped and hoped all over again that they wouldn't kill each other now. Oh, God, what should she do if they killed each other? Would she be able to find Akane all on her own? And if she found her, how on earth should she explain everything to her? How could you possibly explain to someone that two friends of yours strangled each other to death, just because one of them said the false words at the false time?

Oh ‒ dammit. She would be totally damned if they killed each other.

Tension filled the room. Everyone was silent ‒ and Mika nearly got a heartache. Or probably just a vessel in her head would explode.

And then they burst into laughter.

For a moment, Mika couldn't quite understand why they were laughing and not killing each other. Then, finally, she realised: they had been teasing each other the whole time. She could punch herself onto the face for not noticing. Sometimes she couldn't recognise things like that.

"Oh, boys," Naoki said, grinning like always. "I wonder how happy Akane-chan would be if she saw the two of you laughing so hard after everything which had occurred. Oh, and yes. By the way, name's Moriwaki Naoki."

"Speaking of Inspector Tsunemori," Kunizuka said, turning to Kogami, Ginoza and Mika. "How much did you find? You didn't tell us anything, except that Kogami would help look for her."

"Oh, right," Mika said, nodding. She had almost forgotten about the real reason why everyone was here. But since Akane's disappearance the air in the office had been tense and sad. She had missed the laughter and lightheartedness when they didn't have any work to do, because for a change, not their Division but all the others were spammed with cases. And still in all the laughter and happiness when Division One and Karanomori Shion were having fun and Ginoza was scowling all around, Mika still saw a glimpse of sadness in Tsunemori Akane's eyes ‒ the same sadness which had rested there for years. And every time she hoped that, someday, she would be okay again and could be truly happy.

And now she was gone.

Her heart tightened and she cleared her throat before she spoke. _Keep yourself together, Shimotsuki_, she told herself.

"Akane-san left us a note with an address. We went to the address and found some kind of safe house. In her secret apartment, she has collected various notes, containing information on some cases. But all these cases were not real cases. I hope you both know, that in the last twelve months, Division Three had to investigate some cases which weren't actual cases, but shocked calls of dependants."

"Oh, yes. I know," Naoki said. "I've talked with Momota Mai and Takaya Ayaka about it. They were heavily annoyed because of these 'cases.'" He turned to Ginoza. "Oh, and I totally forgot... Mai-chan asked me to ask you, if her beloved Gino-chan would like to go on a date with her. She didn't have a chance to ask you herself. Though since you became an Enforcer, it would make everything easier... "

Ginoza just glared at him and something strange shone in his eyes as he did. Mika wondered what it was.

"However," she continued. "Akane-san was quite interested in them and collected every tiny piece of information she could find. In her opinion, something was odd in these cases, but we had no idea what this odd aspect was. And then Ginoza-san and I went to Inspector Kohara Kagami of Division Three. You know, the one who took over Division Three after the two former Inspectors, Domoto Shuichiro and Suzuki Moe, got killed along with Enforcer Shinjo Kaname in the case of the really, really crazy pyromaniac. However, Kohara let us read the reports about these cases and while all the deaths were simply ridiculous, they were also ordinary. And then we stumbled over something, Ginoza-san didn't see in the final version of the report. This deleted paragraph said that someone was caught by a street scanner around the time of one of these hilarious deaths. But it also said that the measured Psycho-Pass couldn't be matched with a name."

Naoki frowned. He looked strange when he frowned. "So you want to tell us that someone cut some sentences out of a report in which some nameless person was addressed, who was around accidentally?"

"Not accidentally," Ginoza replied. "Whoever this was, he or she had to do something with this death and probably with the others too. There was likely a reason why this part was cut out."

While saying the last words, he had almost whispered.

"So there is some nameless maniac wandering around the town, killing people and letting everything seem like super, super hilarious accidents? And this nameless lunatic is most likely responsible that there isn't someone anymore who can kick Gino's ass without being grounded?" Naoki summarised.

Mika sighed. Why couldn't he just stop saying things like that? Couldn't he guess that they were just childish and mean? Okay, Ginoza was a bit of a commander but he could be really nice sometimes, she had to admit. Just a year after she got assigned, she had noticed her Psycho-Pass was slowly rising. And one day she had said this aloud. Ginoza had been around and had heard her and immediately he had rushed to her, grabbed her shoulders and began to say things so rapidly Mika couldn't understand anything, only single words. And they had been enough to understand that he had told her to keep herself calm and talk about it. He had even offered her to talk to _him_, before he suggested talking to Akane.

Back then she didn't know that he had already lost a partner, his father and even his own position due to extreme levels of stress.

Oh, she hadn't known.

And even if Ginoza Nobuchika was a big, annoying piece of human for Mika, she never forgot the day when he had left his usual attitude and showed her a bit of his true nature.

* * *

When he got home, he immediately sighed deeply.

Still they didn't have a clue where Akane was. Just that a nameless person had been the reason of her disappearance. And that wasn't helping much.

Ginoza took his jacket off, folded it and put it into his shelf. His Enforcer-apartment was small, nothing special for something outside these walls. But for him this apartment was special. Because it was the former flat of his father.

In days like these, he caught himself thinking of his father. Of course, he always thought about him. How couldn't he when he had nightmares about the day he had died and he had lost his left arm? But these days, he thought of him more than usual. And these days, Ginoza regretted more than usual that he couldn't have forgiven him earlier.

His wristband rang and forced him out of his thoughts. He didn't have to look onto the display to know who was calling. In the last two months, he hadn't had the time to face her or even to speak to her. He didn't want to worry her with the fact that Akane was missing. And still he felt guilty that he wasn't answering her calls.

The bracelet rang and rang and he breathed deeply in and out before he took the call for the first time in months.

"Nobu?"

He could see her eyes widen in his imagination and he closed his eyes.

* * *

**The quote is a part of the lyrics of "Killer on the Loose" by the band Thin Lizzy.**

**This chapter will be the last one before this will get more serious. Okay, almost. The next chapter will not only reveal Ginoza's little-big secret somehow, but will also be set almost entirely in the past, and is also Gino-centered.**

**Oh, this will be fun.**

**But because of the length of the chapter (almost 1,000 words longer than the first chapter of _Letters_), the wait for it will be most likely quite long, so I give some more previews of it than usual and the chapter's name.**

**~Preview~**

~1~

"_The robots managed to identify the corpse," he told her, nodding towards some tiny robots surrounding a really, really disgusting corpse. Two years ago she would have vomited onto Ginoza if she had seen a corpse, now she had got attached to it. It scared her._

~2~

"'_Probably'? Wasn´t your life more boring before you became a member of the MWPSB?"_

~3~

_Akane just finished questioning some distressed teacher for mathematics who sweated all the time. He wasn´t suspicious. He was only afraid that his time-plan would get all messed up because of that. Hopefully his Psycho-Pass wouldn´t become clouded._

~4~

"_He was right," she said, looking angry. "There´s no way out of here. We´re damned."_

~5~

"_Okay, I want to say you one more thing: I would prefer it if you would just call me by my first name. I kind of hate it if someone calls me__'[...__]-san.' __And I mean _just_ by my first name. Without those silly addresses."_

~6~

But why had been her hands shaking? What had happened while they had been in the tunnels?

~7~

"You´re living! You´re answering! You have no damn idea how much I´ve worried about you."

~8~

"_I would have been injured by the end and then we were completely lost."_

"_We _are_ completely lost."_

~9~

_After his father had become an Enforcer, his mother had been forced to divorce him, because it was forbidden to be married to an Enforcer. And when Ginoza had been attending high school his mother had died due to some illness. It had been some kind of disastrous fever, but [...]._

~10~

"But something _has_ happened, right? I can hear it in your voice."

**~Preview~**

**Previews in no particular order. (Or are they?)**

**However, we will meet the next time - for Chapter Nine: At First Sight.**

**I can't await it.**

**Momo**

_**\- currently being nervous**_


	10. At First Sight

**I'm terribly, terribly sorry.**

**Aruu (my nice beta-reader) has finished beta-reading this chapter ages ago, but school killed me lately and I wasn't able to look through it and upload it until now. I'm so, so sorry.**

**I hope I didn't enrage anyone or something like that.**

**And even if some of you have given up on reading because of the terrible uploading dates or something like that, I still hope that everyone who reads this chapters will enjoy it.**

**(Also: Look, I have a new cover art for the FF! And it was done by my beta-reader Aruu! :) )**

* * *

**Chapter Nine:**

**At First Sight**

_"Does trust have to be earned. Or is it simply a matter of faith?"_

* * *

_Almost three years ago..._

_Snow was falling gracefully onto the earth. Beautifully shaped unique snowflakes danced over every building, every plant, every human. Their dance seemed endless and far more lovely than every dance humans knew._

_As a little child, Tsunemori Akane had always stormed out of her parents´s house when snow fell. She had cried out in joy and spun and spun until she felt like she had to throw up. Back then she had always ignored the coldness, even if she had only worn a thin dress and looked with every minute more like a snow-girl. She hadn´t cared about anything. For her, only the snowflakes had mattered ‒ nothing more, nothing less._

_And when her father had picked her up and brought her back into the house, because he hadn´t wanted her to catch a cold, Akane had begged and begged to go out again and to build houses of snow. She had never wanted to build snow-people. She had always wanted to build her very own world. Even if it was made of snow._

_Yet, around fifteen years later, Tsunemori Akane still loved the snow, but it didn´t cheer her up anymore, unlike back then._

_White snow was falling over everything and everyone and the world seemed purer than it actually was. And after everything she had been through, she couldn´t stand this all pure, white world anymore. And also, snow always reminded her of her late friend Funahara Yuki, not solely because of her name, but also because of the fact that she had died just one year ago around Christmas Eve._

_Coldness slipped through her clothes as she joined Ginoza Nobuchika. The newbie who got only assigned a little over six months ago, Shimotsuki Mika, the brand-new Enforcer who joined Division One around four months ago, Moriwaki Naoki, and Enforcer Kunizuka Yayoi were off duty, so Akane and Ginoza had been the only ones left in the office when they got a new mission._

_Ginoza stood on the other side of the road and seemed so important that she forgot for a moment that he wasn´t an Inspector anymore._

_The last thirteen months had been more than just hard for the entire Division One. Right after Akane herself got assigned, everything had started. The Talisman Case, the retelling of the Specimen Case, Yuki´s death, the helmet riot, everything with Makishima Shogo and Kogami Shinya´s broken promise... During all these and more events they had suffered and lost so much. Kagari Shusei, a former Enforcer, had gone "missing" after the helmet riot. Masaoka Tomomi, Ginoza´s father, was killed during the hunting of Makishima. Kogami was labeled as a public enemy and was now running away somewhere where no one would find him. And Ginoza himself had been demoted to an Enforcer._

_With her fellow Inspector being a newbie, Akane had to, in fact, manage and shoulder everything on her own. And in the last nine months, she didn´t go completely insane, which was a good sign, she assumed._

_A young woman had been killed, around thirty, while going home through some shortcut. Because of the lack of street scanners in this area, she had been killed quietly and secretly without anyone knowing. This morning, some jogger went through the same shortcut and found the corpse which had laid the whole night there without being noticed. The jogger had been sent to medical care and the robots still tried to identify the corpse._

_As Akane walked over to Ginoza, he looked up, his green eyes shining in the pale light of the snowing sky._

"_The robots managed to identify the corpse," he told her, nodding towards some tiny robots surrounding a really, really disgusting corpse. Two years ago, she would have vomited onto Ginoza if she had seen a corpse, but now she had got attached to it. It scared her._

_Ginoza looked at the little screen flying over his bracelet. "Kaneko Yasuko, thirty-three years old, single, teacher."_

_Akane gazed to the corpse. Probably Kaneko Yasuko had been beautiful when she lived. It broke Akane´s heart that now her beauty had faded into some disgusting picture of blood and flesh._

"_Did she have any family?" she asked, not taking her eyes off the corpse. From the corner of her eye, she could see Ginoza nodding._

"_Her parents are long dead, but she has a younger sister who still lives."_

_She closed her eyes. She had assumed so._

"_Has anybody contacted her already?"_

_He shook his head. "No. I waited until you were here, Inspector."_

_Akane opened her eyes and turned to her colleague. "Some information about her murderer?"_

"_None."_

_She bit her lips. "Tell the robots to bring the corpse to the Bureau and then come back here. We have to question Kaneko´s sister. Probably she knows something."_

* * *

_The snow kept falling when they arrived. Kaneko Mizuka, Kaneko Yasuko´s younger sister, lived at the thirteenth floor of a building with a hundred floors. She was twenty-four years old, worked as a reporter for some news channel and was like her sister ‒ unmarried and single. Their mother had died shortly after Mizuka´s birth, leaving the girls alone with their father. However, their father had died when Mizuka was barely eight years old. Left all alone in the world, the two girls had to fight their own battles without any parents watching over them. They didn´t even have any other relatives who could have looked after them. In fact, Kaneko Yasuko had become a mother at the age of seventeen._

_Akane had contacted analyst Karanomori Shion and asked her to check Kaneko Yasuko and her sister. Both of them had an average Crime Coefficient and there was nothing suspicious about them. They had been just two sisters with a terrible fate. And one had become a teacher and the other a moderator. Akane even thought she had seen Kaneko Mizuka on some random news channel someday, but she wasn´t sure._

_They reached the hundred-floored building and took the elevator to floor number thirteen. Nobody said a word, and Akane wondered what Ginoza thought. Like Mizuka, he had lost his whole family to crime. After his father had become an Enforcer, his mother had been forced to divorce him, because it was forbidden to be married to an Enforcer. And when Ginoza had been attending high school, his mother had died due to some illness. It had been some kind of disastrous fever, but Kogami Shinya had always said ‒ Ginoza had told Akane ‒ that his mother had died because of the many years of grief. Akane wasn´t even sure _if_ someone was able to die of grief._

_She and Ginoza walked through the floor and Akane was impressed by the beautiful holograms filling the floor and the walls. The floors in her own apartment building were cold and hollow. Only few people thought that the floor holograms had to be beautiful too._

_Akane knocked on the door with the number twenty-eight on it. It took a moment until the door opened._

_The woman who opened looked like the woman from the picture Karanomori had sent to them. But on the picture her hair had been tied into a ponytail and she had looked serious in her pantsuit. Now Kaneko Mizuka´s wavy brown hair reached down to her shoulders and beyond, framing her face and the shining blue eyes. She was only a few centimetres taller than Akane herself. The one who opened the door looked younger than in the picture, but it was impossible that she could be someone else than Kaneko Mizuka ‒ the victim´s younger sister._

"_Good forenoon," Mizuka said, her voice steady. Most people were quite nervous when the MWPSB stood before their door and knocked, but she didn´t lose her self assurance. Or she didn´t yet._

"_How can I help you?"_

"_As you can see, we´re from the Ministry of Welfare´s Public Safety Bureau´s Crime Investigation Department and we would appreciate it if you could answer some questions for us," Akane said politely._

_Mizuka´s blue eyes scanned over Akane and then turned into ice when she did the same with Ginoza, before she nodded, not taking her eyes off Ginoza._

"_Well... come in, then."_

_She opened the door widely and led them into the living room, closing the door behind Akane. _

"_Take a seat," Mizuka said and sat herself onto a comfortable looking chair. Her living room was elegant, but not pompous. It was the perfect combination of elegance, comfortableness and aesthetic plainness._

_Akane sat onto a couch and Ginoza put himself next to her._

"_Do you want something to drink or to eat?" Mizuka asked. "Not that I want to bribe you in some way, but my sister taught me to always offer guests drinks and food, you know?"_

Her sister._ Akane straightened her back and forced herself to smile._

"_No, thanks." She turned to Ginoza and blinked at him. He didn´t say anything. Mizuka rose one eyebrow._

"_Could it be that your companion isn´t able to speak, Detective-san?" she coldly asked._

"_I don´t want anything, either," he said after a while, keeping his eyes on Mizuka. They were usually completely stoic, but now something glimmered in them._

_Mizuka grinned wickedly and then nodded. "Okay. Then I don´t have to prepare anything. That´s good." She crossed her legs._

"_And why exactly do you think I could help you in some case? And no denying. I know that you need help in some case. It´s always like that. Or does the Ministry send people from the MWPSB to check Hues latterly?"_

_Akane kept her smile. This Kaneko Mizuka was an arduous woman. "No, we aren´t here for Crime Coefficient checks."_

_Mizuka nodded again. "Then I assumed right and you need my help for some case for some reason?"_

"_Exactly."_

_She grinned. "Wow. That´s new. The MWPSB has never visited me. My sister always said that this was wonderful because visits from the MWPSB usually meant trouble. And she wanted a life without any trouble for me. But you have to know that a life without trouble is kind of ‒ how should I say this? ‒ _boring_."_

"_Probably," Akane answered, her mouth dry._

"'_Probably'? Wasn´t your life more boring before you became a member of the MWPSB?"_

"_I wouldn´t say that it was boring... but nothing particular special happened back then. My life had been... calm back then. Yes ‒ 'calm' is the right word."_

_Mizuka´s eyes glowed up for a second and then darkened. "So... you prefer working for the MWPSB over living an ordinary life?"_

"_I... ," Akane started but Ginoza cut her off._

"_I don´t think you have to answer these questions, Inspector," he said, glaring at Kaneko Mizuka. "She eats our time, Inspector."_

"_I´m not eating anything, Enforcer," she spit out, eying Ginoza._

_He wanted to reply something, but Akane was faster. "It´s okay, Ginoza-san. And I just realised that we didn´t even introduced ourselves. I´m Inspector Tsunemori Akane of Division One, and this is my colleague ‒ Enforcer Ginoza Nobuchika. You don´t have to introduce yourself. We already now that you´re Kaneko Mizuka-san."_

"_I assumed that," Mizuka nodded. "And now... how can I help you, Inspector Tsunemori?"_

_Despite her petite looks, Kaneko Mizuka was really cunning. Akane hoped that she wouldn´t drive Ginoza to the edge during the investigation. But for now the questioning mattered._

_Akane cleared her throat. "Last night, someone was killed, not that far from here. There weren´t any street scanners in the street where the victim was killed, so the corpse was found first this morning by some jogger."_

"_And how does this have to do anything with me?" Mizuka asked, raising an eyebrow._

_If she could, Akane would avoid the next sentence. But she knew that she didn´t have the right to do anything like that. Kaneko Mizuka had the right to know everything._

"_The victim, you have to know," Akane said, her mouth dry. "was no one else than your sister ‒ Kaneko Yasuko."_

* * *

_It broke her heart to see her shocked face._

_Just a moment ago Mizuka had been full of self assurance and was even trying everything to annoy Ginoza for some point. And now, her pale face was a mask of shock, despair and sadness. And Akane thought that it could be that she had been coming with this information too fast and harshly. That she should have said it more softly. If someone had told her about Yuki´s death, rather than her seeing it herself, she would have wanted that they would have said it carefully to her. Oh, Akane never felt so stupid than in this moment._

"_Oh, I apo-"_

"_You don´t have to," Mizuka said fast. "I know that you think that you weren´t careful saying something like that so right away. But you have to know that there is nothing wrong with that. If you remove a plaster you have to be fast too, don´t you? Also ‒ I´m an adult. Not a little child. And it´s not like I´ve never experienced loss in my life before."_

_She tried a smile, but it was just a line full of sadness._

"_So... you want to know if Yasuko had some kind of problems, ya? And I´m afraid to say that she was acting strange lately. She told me that she was fine, so I wasn´t asking further. She never lied to me, you have to know. And now I´m scolding myself that I wasn´t asking further. If somebody else had said something like that, I would have done it. But I trusted my sister. And she has never hid something from me before... I´m afraid that this is everything I can tell you."_

_Akane nodded slowly. "And... and is this really everything? You have no clue why your sister could have been acting strange?"_

_Mizuka tilted her head. "Hm... if you say it like that... I think that it has to do anything with her work. I mean... she didn´t have any friends except me. And I was her only family left. And I´m pretty sure that she wasn´t upset because of anything I did. When we were kids and I destroyed the microwave and the television at once, Yasuko didn´t scold me. She never did. And if she had some kind of problem with me, she would tell me straightaway. So I assume it had to do something with her work."_

"_Can you please tell us something about her work?" Ginoza asked but Mizuka ignored him like a champion by looking completely distracted by some fluff on a lampshade. Akane wondered why she didn´t like him. Or did she not like Enforcers as a whole?_

"_Can you please tell us something about her work, Kaneko-san?" Akane repeated Ginoza´s question and this time, Mizuka answered._

"_You probably know that Yasu was a teacher. A pretty good one too. She did all her tests astonishingly well back then and could have become simply everything. But in the end, she picked the job which she always wanted to have. Yasu always wanted to be a teacher. She liked teaching and was really good at explaining things. And also she never lost her temper. Also, after she found out that she wasn´t able to have kids on her own, she wanted to be a teacher even more badly. She loved children so much and it destroyed her when she found out that she would never be a mother. However, Yasuko has always told me how nice her colleagues were. And that she was doing well with all of them, even if she didn´t quite befriend them. Even if she was the loveliest person I knew and will always know she didn´t trust a person despite me."_

"_But if everything was fine with her work, why do you think her death has to do with anything from her workplace?"_

"_In the last months Yasuko got... new colleagues. She never talked about them much. But if she did, I could guess from the way she talked about them that something was wrong with them or probably with just one of them. She never told me names so she could probably have always been speaking about only one person all the time."_

_Even if Mizuka was a great piece of work, her openness for police work was impressive. But also the way she spoke about all those thinks let Akane wonder..._

"_Oh, I have an idea," she told Akane out of sudden. "I will lead you to Yasu´s school and then we do some investigation."_

"_And why should we take you with us?" Ginoza said, his green eyes glaring._

_To Akane´s surprise, Mizuka answered with a grin all over her face._

"_Because you wouldn´t find anybody else who knows this school as well as I do."_

* * *

_The school was surprisingly simple and looked like one of those schools of the old days which were illustrated in some books. Akane´s own school had been built no more than ten years ago and was all made of metal, steel and glass. This one was half-way made of bricks and wood. It was always fascinating seeing such a building surrounded by all those glass-houses and skyscrapers._

_Mizuka had told them that she had gone to this school herself, because her sister had already been a teacher when she entered middle school at the age of thirteen._

_Niji Academy was not solely a middle school but also a high school, so Mizuka had gone to school here until she became eighteen. Because of that, she had plenty of time to get to know every little corner in the building. She also had told them that she had always been bored by her classmates back then and had nothing better to do than to make an investigation-like thing through the whole building. During this time, she had memorized every centimetre of Niji Academy which was really practical if you wanted to escape school during the recesses without someone noticing._

_Kaneko Mizuka guided them to the secretary while telling them how a boy of her class climbed through the funnels to get to the teacher´s lounge secretly once and scared the hell out of them when he suddenly jumped out of the funnels. This boy, she told them, later became a latent criminal._

_While Mizuka told them her story, Akane wondered if Kogami had done similar things when he had been a school-boy, before putting the thought away. Of course not. He became a latent criminal for wanting revenge for his colleague and friend too badly. And not because he only had thoughts about how to scare his teachers and other people._

"_I wonder if Tamura-san´s still the secretary," Mizuka said. "You have to know, even if he could just use the new technologies, Kobayashi-san, the director, decided to get a secretary for Niji. And we all were pretty glad about this. Tamura-san´s the nicest secretary you could find. She even made cookies for the kids every day. Kobayashi-san´s also quite nice. He knew Yasu still from the time when she had gone here to school and told her back then if she became a teacher in the future, he would love her to be a teacher at his school. And he didn´t forget it after so many years."_

_From the way Mizuka talked about her old school, Akane could guess how much she had loved being a student at Niji Academy. That this place could have a connection to her sister´s death should be quite a damage for her._

_They reached the secretary, but before they entered, Akane´s attention was drawn by some picture. It was a framed picture of a good-looking young girl, probably fifteen or sixteen of age. The picture was in some glass-case and around it laid dozens of flowers, cards and drawings. _"We miss you"_ was written in beautifully rolled letters all over a piece of paper. Mizuka also noticed the picture in the case and frowned at it._

"_A pupil of this school apparently died," she said, her voice low and steady. "Kato Azami. The name doesn´t tell me anything," she muttered and then went to the secretary._

_To Mizuka´s joy, Tamura was still the secretary of Niji Academy and they chatted whole fifteen minutes about the good, old times while Akane hoped that Ginoza´s eyes wouldn´t pop out because of the abundance of eye-rolls. Then finally, Akane could tell Tamura why they were here and Director Kobayashi joined them. He was quite shocked at the news of Yasuko´s death and couldn´t believe that her death could have a connection to her workplace. Still, he decided to help them with their investigation. Akane also asked about Kato Azami, the deceased girl, and Kobayashi told them in a sad voice that she had always been a good student and that it had been a shame when her corpse had been pulled out of some river. Ginoza then remembered that Momota Mai of Division Three had once told him that they had to investigate the death of a girl of sixteen years but couldn´t find a clue about a possible murder and the case had been marked as an accident. They talked about this case for a bit before Akane, Ginoza and Mizuka went off to question some teachers and students._

_Akane left her police jacket in the car because Mizuka had told her that it would be better if nobody knew that they were from the MWPSB. Also Ginoza had to hide his Enforcer-bracelet carefully. That Mizuka was also participating in questioning heavily annoyed Ginoza. But Akane had to say that Mizuka had been very good in everything until now. There were also so many teachers and students. It would be too much work for just the two of them._

_Akane just finished questioning some distressed teacher for mathematics who sweated all the time. He wasn´t suspicious. He was only afraid that his time-plan would get all messed up because of that. Hopefully his Hue wouldn´t become clouded._

_She walked to the cafeteria to question some people there and found Ginoza talking to some scowling boy, chewing a gum and looking probably even more annoyed than Ginoza himself. When she stepped next to him, the boy went off and Ginoza turned to her._

"_Did you find something?" he asked, still scowling._

_Akane shook her head. "Nothing. Probably Kaneko-san was wrong."_

_He muttered something she couldn´t understand but she assumed that it was something bad about Mizuka._

"_By the way, Dime´s doing well," she said, wanting to distract him._

_Ginoza looked down at her and nodded. After his demotion he had not been able to take care of his beloved dog anymore, so she had volunteered to take Dime in. Sometimes, she took Ginoza out and brought him to her apartment so he could be with his beloved pet. It was beautiful to see him with Dime. It was like seeing an entirely new Ginoza Nobuchika._

_Akane looked around. She knew that she shouldn´t ask but she was afraid that she had to._

"_Ginoza-san, could you please look where Kaneko-san is? She is Kaneko Yasuko´s only relative and emergency address. She is the only one who could help us in this case. That she runs around here all on her own makes me worry and nervous. I mean... somewhere in this building could be the person who killed her sister," she said, her voice low._

_Ginoza looked down at her, looking heavily annoyed. He sighed. "Of course, Inspector."_

"_I´m sorry," she said after him, but he had already left the cafeteria._

* * *

_It had been hard for her to take over a whole Division all on her own, he knew that. She had been an Inspector for just a few months when she had to shoulder everything by herself. The first few months had been the hardest. With everything just being formed into something new. Of course, now she had a fellow Inspector by her side, but Shimotsuki Mika was inexperienced because of the lack of serious cases in the last few months. So Tsunemori Akane still had to do everything on her own. Ginoza liked to imagine if Kogami had stayed back then, she would have manged her new situation even better. But even if she was doing everything really well ‒ she was really talented after all ‒ he caught her sleeping on her desk sometimes. And while she slept she muttered words he couldn´t understand and tensed up. Like she was having nightmares._

_Ginoza looked out of the window, seeing snow flakes falling down. Akane loaded everything on her own shoulders, keeping everything away from the rest of them. Even if her Hue never clouded, everyone knew that she was having a hard time with everything: Kogami´s leaving, the deaths of Masaoka and Kagari, all the duties as an Inspector, the newbies Mika and Naoki. Probably she was still hunted by the death of her friend and even of Makishima Shogo. So he had sworn to himself that he wouldn´t bedevil her and do everything she said without much protest. Only because of this, Ginoza accepted her request to look after Kaneko Mizuka._

_He found her sitting in one of the armchairs of the library. He couldn´t believe it. She should question people! Not reading books!_

_Akane clearly needed some sleep._

_Ginoza walked towards her when some young man with dark brown hair and a nice face began to talk to Mizuka. He stopped and frowned. Mizuka and the man chatted for a while before she stood up smiling and then waved him goodbye with the book in her hand in a friendly way. The man turned and walked away, and Mizuka went straight to Ginoza, took one of his arms and dragged him to some corner._

"_Where´s Inspector Tsunemori?" she asked him, her smile faded, her face serious._

"_I don´t know... ," he answered, freeing his arm from her grip._

_Mizuka sighed. "Okay. Then I have to tell you then. Did you see the man who was just talking to me? He´s suspicious."_

_Ginoza frowned again._

"_Why should he be suspicious?"_

"_He knew who I was."_

"_I don´t think something like this would make someone sus- "_

"_You don´t understand," Mizuka interrupted harshly. "He´s too young to be one of my former teachers. And I never entered this school after my graduation till today."_

"_Probably he recognised you because of your sister," Ginoza said, rolling his eyes. This woman was really a danger for the case._

"You don´t understand,_" she hissed. "Yasuko didn´t look like me! She had black hair and dark brown eyes like our father. Not even our faces were alike. She looked like a prettier female version of our dad. I look exactly like a younger version of our mother. There is _no way_ that someone would recognise me as Yasu´s sister."_

"_He... "_

"_It´s impossible for him to know me!" Mizuka said. "When Yasu and me walked around together and bought something, everyone thought we were just friends, not sisters. I don´t think he recognised me because we met someday or because he saw Yasu in me. He recognised me because he saw a picture of me! Yasuko always talked about me at work ‒ she told me. She liked talking about me. But she never told them my name or showed photos of me to her colleagues. They shouldn´t know how I look like. Like I already said, Yasu never trusted anyone. She thought it would be better if no one knew the ones you loved. So even if she always had some old pics of me in her purse, she never showed them off. They were solely for herself._

"_And when Inspector Tsunemori gave me the things Yasu had with her when she died to check if something was missing, I lied. There _was_ something missing. An old photograph which my father took of me when I was six years old. She loved this pic because she loved the way I smiled in it for some reason. Yasuko would have _never_ lost it. Her murderer took the photo out of her purse because he wanted to know how I look like. Even if I was six when the pic was taken, he could recognise my hair, my eyes, the similarities to the childish version of my face. This man killed my sister. He killed the loveliest person on this planet and I want to know why. And if you don´t help me... "_

"_No threatening," he muttered and tried dialing Akane._

"_That´s unnecessary," Mizuka said. "This place doesn´t allow anyone except the secretary and the director to make calls. You know, because they want the kids to focus on the school."_

"_Then we have to search for her," Ginoza suggested._

_She shook her head. "There´s no time. He already heard what we´ve said and ran away seconds ago. I saw someone running away behind the bookshelves. And don´t tell me that there are many people running around in libraries because there are _not_. Dammit, I should have been more careful."_

_Mizuka put the book away and ran away. Ginoza followed her._

"_We have to find Tsunemori!" he shouted._

"_We have to catch this man! We can´t let him run away! Inspector-san will understand this!" she shouted back, climbing down the stairs. Ginoza cursed. Akane had told him to look after Mizuka, so he had no other option than following her._

_They hurried down the cellar where the man with the brown hair just ran into. Now the students were having classes so there weren´t many people in the corridors, which was a good thing. They had promised to Kobayashi that they wouldn´t scare anyone after all._

_Just as they entered one area of the cellar, they found themselves in a dead end. They turned but the man with the brown hair stood at the door._

"_I´m sorry, but I can´t allow the two of you to ruin everything," he said and shook his head. "It´s a shame that you cooperated with the police, Kaneko Mizuka. If you hadn´t, you could have had the chance to live. But now you have nothing. I hope that you like the fact that you´re going to die with some filthy hunting dog in one and the same room."_

_Then he closed the door and locked it before any of them could react. Ginoza, in fact, never cursed. But now he did it the second time this day. If he had had a Dominator, he would have shot this man, but they did not have calculated that they would find the culprit so fast. He hated it when things didn´t go as he wanted._

_Ginoza turned to Mizuka. "You said that you knew every corner of this building. So now tell me how we can escape."_

"_He was right," she said, looking angry. "There´s no way out of here. We´re damned, Hunting Dog."_

_Then her blue eyes turned into burning ice._

"_Why didn´t you do anything? Aren´t you an Enforcer? Aren´t you supposed to hunt after culprits while the Inspectors investigate? Aren´t you supposed to struggle him down or shoot him with one of those Dominators? But you let him go! You let him leave! He killed my sister and you _let him leave_!"_

_Yet the time had come he didn´t want to stand this anymore. This woman had annoyed him from the first time they met. And now one of his blood vessels in his head was about to explode._

"_I have no damn idea what you´re problem is, Kaneko. But we aren´t just _'hunting dogs.'_ We´re humans who were labeled as latent criminals because the System´s afraid that we could begin someday to kill people or something like that. Because our Psycho-Passes would never recover, some of us are assigned as Enforcer so the Inspectors´s Psycho-Passes didn´t need to rise during investigations. But that doesn´t necessarily mean that we _'hunting dogs'_ are always able to fight! I don´t have a Dominator with me and I have to admit that I was always a poor fighter so it would not have been intelligent to tackle this guy and try to fight him. I would have been injured by the end and then we were completely lost."_

"_We _are_ completely lost," Mizuka said, rolling her eyes._

"_You know what I mean."_

"_Sorry, but I have no idea what goes on in the mind of a hunting dog."_

"_And I´m ashamed that I have no idea what is going on in _your_ head, Kaneko. Since the investigation started you openly showed me your hate against _'hunting dogs.'_ I have no problem with your opinion. But even now, in a hopeless situation, the only thing you can think about is how to show this filthy _'hunting dog'_ that he´s just a useless and unnecessary human being, and not how to work out a plan to get out of here! And now... please tell me who was the one who brought us into this desperate situation. Me, who wanted to get Inspector Tsunemori, or you, who refused and said we had to chase after some man without the possibility to contact someone if we needed help?"_

_Mizuka looked a long time into his eyes, her own still ice-cold, before she suddenly leaned against a wall and slid down on her back to the ground. A short and sharp laugh escaped her lips._

"_I guess my sister was right. Someday this attitude of mine would kill me. And now this time has finally come. Even if you´re an Enforcer, I´m sorry for dragging you with me into death. You have to know... I´m afraid but there´s no way we could escape from here, Enforcer. There´s no stone or piece of dust in this school I don´t know. Every room has a connection to the funnels ‒ every room except this one. And it´s not like this is some old castle full of secret passages."_

_From her seating position Mizuka looked up at him. Her face was without hope, without faith. "We´re going to die, Enforcer, so no need in working out escape plans. We´re going to die here without ever knowing why my sister got killed or what will happen to this man or even to Inspector Tsunemori-san. We´re doomed, dearie."_

_Ginoza smirked. "As I thought."_

_She blinked. "Excuse me?"_

_He crossed his arms. "As I assumed you would fall out your shell after I would tell you that we need a plan, that we need to focus."_

"_I have no damned idea what you want to say."_

"_My point is... I wanted to see your desperate face."_

_Mizuka glared at him but he didn´t mind. In fact, he was amused for the first time after... oh hell... months? Years? He couldn´t help himself from grinning._

"_On the way to this Academy I memorised the blue prints. And I have to say that you´re wrong: there _is_ a way out of here." Ginoza kneeled onto the ground and began to slowly remove stone by stone with his artificial left arm. When he was done, a huge hole with a latter on one side was revealed. From the cellar room it seemed that the latter reached into nothing more than shadows._

"_This room is right above some old canals. When this place became a school this entrance to the canals was sealed with stones. To our luck the hole was sealed with this stones quite poorly, still you´re not able to remove them with normal human hands, but with robotic ones you can." He showed her his metallic left arm._

"_In fact, I´m quite a skilled fighter. I train since I became an Enforcer. The only reason why I didn´t attack him was to see you desperate and that I knew that we could go out here every time."_

_Ginoza smirked again. "And now please tell me who the useless one is?"_

* * *

_It had taken quite a while to climb the latter and to finally reach the canals. Mizuka hadn´t said a word while climbing which had amused him in every possible way. Now they walked through the tunnels which were incredibly long and didn´t say a word._

"_One question," Ginoza suddenly said while he led the path to freedom._

"_Hm?" She turned her attention to him._

"_Even if I think you´re immensely annoying I have to admit that I was quite impressed how you could lead the investigation. How you noticed every tiny piece of everything. And still you´re a moderator of some small news channel. I mean it seems that you have fun doing all these things. And there´s no way Sibyl wouldn´t have noticed your talent for being an Inspector."_

_Mizuka´s expression suddenly changed. She seemed kind of... tortured. Ginoza lifted an eyebrow. He didn´t expect this._

_She bit her lips. "I actually got an offer of the MWPSB but I refused."_

"_Why?"_

_She swallowed. "You´re right. I _love_ investigating. I´ve read every existing detective story and most of the time I figured out the culprit by myself. And also did Yasuko. I was the more skilled one of us and I loved investigating more than she did, so it nearly killed me that I could never be a detective like I always wished."_

"_Did she forbid you to become a detective?"_

"_What can you tell me about my father?" Mizuka asked, avoiding his question._

"_He died in a car accident when you were eight. He was the head of some facility."_

_She closed her eyes. "As I thought. You just know that, right? He married my mother, got two lovely daughters, his wife passed away, he raised his children on his own until he died in some accident. That´s all, right? Everyone thinks this. But only two people except the Ministry of Welfare know who my father _really_ was, how he _really_ died. Okay, one person except the Ministry."_

_He blinked. "What do you mean? How he really died... ?"_

_Mizuka turned to him. "Do you want to know why I hate Enforcers so much? Why I couldn´t become an Inspector?"_

"_I have no idea... "_

"_Can´t you guess? My father got killed by an Enforcer."_

* * *

"_Not he was only killed by an Enforcer. My father was also an Inspector once. He was the Sheperd One of Division Two back then and the best detective I know. Everyone respected him and he got along well with all of his colleagues. He trusted everyone and everyone trusted him. But then one day one of his Enforcers killed him during an investigation. He stabbed my father with the murder weapon of the case they had to investigate. My father trusted him and then this Enforcer killed him cold-blooded. Of course, this would have caused disaster if the public would get to know it. An Inspector killed by an Enforcer. Unbelievable. Inspectors and Enforcers fight crimes so everyone can sleep well. Even if the Enforcers are latent criminals, because the Ministry of Welfare assured that they could handle them. That the Inspectors could handle them. And now one Inspector was killed by one of these 'handled' latent criminals. Of course, the Ministry couldn´t possibly let somebody find out of this accident. So they deleted Dad´s file and replaced it with a fake one where he was the head of a company and got killed in a car accident. Only Yasuko and I knew the truth, but the Ministry took care that we would never reveal the ugly truth to the public. It helped us with money. We needed money. Without it, we would have died a long time ago. But we didn´t remain silent only because of the money. We knew that we would be killed if we said anything. Dad wouldn´t want us to die, so we remained silent._

"_Before that, we loved the Ministry and that it assured our safety, but after that, we hated it silently. We got to know the real face of the Ministry of Welfare and we didn´t like it. Of course, our Psycho-Passes rose, but we struggled to keep them under 100. Because we knew this secret of the MWPSB we couldn´t be detectives ourselves. We didn´t want to belong to a facility which did such things only to protect the System. Also my sister feared that this could not be the only case where an Inspector was killed by an Enforcer. That this could happen to me too if I would join the MWPSB. We began to hate Enforcers because of this, even if our father taught us to respect them for their will to keep the society safe, even if the society rejected them."_

_Ginoza had listened to her silently. Now he understood. And still he wasn´t able to find the right words for a reply, so they walked silently side by side. Only with the swash of water under their feet._

"_My father was once an Inspector," he finally said and Mizuka turned her attention back at him. He didn´t know why he had started like this, only that it felt somewhat right._

"_He entered the police before the Sibyl System was established. And after that he became an Inspector of the MWPSB. But he had a hard time to accept the new methods to hunt criminals. He didn´t like the new Dominators, because they took Inspectors their free thinking and estimating. For him, Inspectors had become the sole carriers of these guns. The carriers without free will. And because of the way he thought, my father became an latent criminal and later an Enforcer. I was just a kid back then and for me this was some kind of betrayal. My mother was forced to divorce from my father and then died some time later, leaving me to my grandmother. I developed a strong hate against Enforcers due to the 'betrayal' of my father. And still I worked and worked to become an Inspector to be by his side. In the end, I became an Inspector like I have always wished. I was even assigned to the same Division as my dad. But after some years I began to doubt the System´s actions. And around this time my Psycho-Pass rose and rose until I became an Enforcer myself. I never did anything to anyone or thought about hurting anyone and still I was labeled as a latent criminal. The System labels everyone, who doesn´t approve it, as latent criminals and ruins their lives, because it fears that someday these people could take it down. I never thought about taking down the System. I just began to doubt. I think in today´s world, doubting is like committing a crime. I mean... what´s the difference? You say one little word against the System and your Hue gets clouded. I have no idea what Sibyl exactly is, but sometimes it is just random what they do. It does everything it can to keep its position as our government, as our judges, as our emperors._

"_Most of the Enforcers I know are nice people. They would never hurt anyone, but still they are latent criminals because Sibyl fears them, I think. Sibyl fears that someday everyone could think like them and then it wouldn´t be able to rule anymore. So they keep punishing the ones who keep thinking their own thoughts, so everyone begins to fear thinking. Sibyl doesn´t want us to think, it wants us as chessmen whom it can handle and play with. Because of that, I believe, some Enforcers begin to really turn into criminals. Not because they are bad people, but because Sibyl takes everything from them and spreads the myth that every latent criminal is solely evil and Enforcers mere 'hunting dogs.' That they aren´t humans like us, but wild animals which we need to tame._

"_I believe that this Enforcer who killed your father didn´t actually hate your father. He hated the System. And because he couldn´t kill the System, he killed your father in some kind of rage state. Because your father was an Inspector, and probably my father was right, and Inspectors nowadays are really just carriers of the Sibyl´s Dominators and will."_

_Only now he noticed that Mizuka stared at him and Ginoza smiled a little, shy smile._

"_Sorry, I´m usually not the one who gives talks."_

_She continued staring at him for a while before she closed her eyes and shook her head, before she opened them again._

"_No, no. I´m... I think you did well."_

_Suddenly she smiled._

"_I... I think... I think I was wrong all the time. That Enforcers aren´t really as dangerous as the System always tells us. I´m sorry for the things I´ve said to you."_

"_It´s alright."_

"_No, it isn´t. I wronged you and I´m sorry. Can you forgive me?"_

"_I can."_

_Her smile grew bigger._

"_But that doesn´t mean I will."_

_Mizuka´s smile dropped and Ginoza laughed a bit._

"_That was a joke."_

"_You looked serious as hell, Ginoza-san."_

_This was the first time she had called him like this._

_He shrugged. "I´m not used to joking, Kaneko-san."_

_She patted his back. "You will learn, dearie. Also... what had happened to your father, by the way?"_

"_He died earlier this year, saving me."_

"_I´m sorry."_

_Ginoza shook his head. "You don´t have to"_

_She was silent for a while before rising her voice again._

"_Okay, I want to say you one more thing: I would prefer it if you would just call me by my first name. I kind of hate it if someone calls me 'Kaneko-san.' And I mean _just_ by my first name. Without those silly addresses."_

_Ginoza nodded. "Alright, Mizuka."_

_Suddenly she stared at him. He looked back at her, puzzled._

"_Did I do something wrong?"_

"_No," she said quietly._

"_I... You have to know that no one called me like that after my father´s death. Everyone calls me 'Kana.'"_

_He frowned. "'Kana'?"_

_She nodded. "You know... 'Kana' like an alteration of my romanised surname 'Kaneko.' It´s a nickname."_

"_So you want me to call you 'Kana'?"_

_Mizuka smiled a bright smile and suddenly looked truly beautiful._

"_I want you to call me 'Mizuka,' Nobuchika."_

* * *

When they had finally arrived at the end of the tunnels, they had not hesitated to run back to the Academy. They had run up the stairs and had searched for Akane and the brown-haired man. When they had finally found them in the empty cafeteria, Akane had been standing over the paralysed version of the man. She had held a Dominator in her hand and her face had been dark. Her expression had been hard and angry when she had looked down at him. Ginoza hadn´t known why she had looked like this or why she had tried to stop her free hand from shaking but he had assumed that the man had said something which had enraged her. But why had been her hands shaking? What had happened while they had been in the tunnels?

He never knew. He never asked.

After this, they had interrogated the man ‒ Ito Atsushi ‒ who had told them everything. He had killed Yasuko because she had found out that he had killed the student, this girl Kato Azami, after she had seen him dealing with drugs. And he had wanted to kill Mizuka too, because Yasuko had once said that she told her sister everything and he had been afraid that she knew about his murder too.

This had happened in December 2113 ‒ almost two years ago.

Ginoza Nobuchika´s bracelet rang and rang and he breathed deeply in and out before he took the call for the first time in months.

"Nobu?"

He could see her eyes widen in his imagination and he closed his eyes. He took another deep breath and collected his thoughts. He had never wanted to tell her what happened. But he knew that someday he had to. And now this time had come.

"Hi," he said faintly.

"Nobu!" she cried out in relief. "You´re living! You´re answering! You have no damned idea how much I´ve worried about you. I thought you died in action and Akane-san didn´t have the time and courage to tell me."

Another deep breath.

"Nothing like this happened," Ginoza started with an icy voice.

"But something _has_ happened, right? I can hear it in your voice."

It took him everything to explain Kaneko Mizuka what had happened to Akane.

* * *

**The quote is taken from the novel "At First Sight" by Nicholas Sparks, as the chapter's name is taken from its title.**

**Puh. This chapter was a mess. Actually, I had planned to make it even longer and even more detailed, but then I already had over 7,000 words and I told myself "Oh, probably you should cut some bits and try bringing it to an end before you suddenly have a little mini 'companion' story." Now the story has a bit over 8,000 words and is still a mess, but I hope it's okay nevertheless.**

**I don't know when the next chapter will come out as I have to change some bits of it before giving it to Aruu and everything, but I will hurry.**

**But until then, have some snippets!**

**~Preview~**

~1~

His eyes wandered to the clock on Karanomori´s desk. _2:33_. Naoki sighed. She was now over two hours under the shower. If she got out, she would look like some fine, old granny.

~2~

The wind ruffled his black hair when he stopped and put down the helmet. He narrowed his eyes and looked through the dark night.

~3~

"I didn´t know, that you´re actually such a moron, Inspector Tsunemori Akane."

~4~

"You really want to use this against an unarmed?"

~5~

Suddenly a frown crossed his forehead.

_No._

No, this couldn´t be possible.

**~Preview~**

**Until next time!**

**Momo**

**_\- currently trying to catch up with everythin_g**


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